Tesla Model Y : The Best Cold Weather EV
Tesla Model Y : Tesla's Affordable Cold-Weather EV
Tesla has finally produced a vehicle for the most popular segment in North America: the mid-size SUV. The Tesla Model Y is destined to become Tesla's most popular vehicle. With a base price of $39,000 (base version will be available later in 2020), this Tesla SUV is now obtainable by mere mortals.
Order a Tesla Model Y using the following link, and you'll also receive 1000 miles of free Supercharging! Use a referral link like the one below when placing your Model Y order in order to receive this extra benefit:
Electric Vehicles in Cold Weather: What's the Issue?
Cold weather affects the efficiency of all vehicles. Moving parts don't slide as well when oils and other fluids are cold and thick. Cold air is denser, affecting aerodynamic efficiency at highway speeds. Winter tire tread compounds are softer that all-season tires, which gives you better traction when cold weather causes all-season tire compounds to become too hard, but does result in some efficiency loss.
When you drive a combustion vehicle in cold weather, you might notice a slight drop in gas mileage, but more often you just don't notice any difference at all. This is because a gasoline engine is inherently inefficient. Only about 20-30% of the energy in the gasoline gets converted into useful work - the rest of the energy is wasted in the form of heat and noise. If all of the cold weather factors reduce efficiency by 10%, then that 10% only applies to the portion of the gasoline that was used as useful work - the 20-30%. If your car was 30% efficient in summer, it now becomes (0.3 * (1 - 0.1)) = .27, or 27%. This is only a 3% drop in efficiency. Which means that a 30mpg vehicle has now become a 29.1mpg vehicle - hardly any difference.
Cold weather is where an EV's efficiency kind of works against itself. Electric Vehicles are about 90% efficient at converting the energy in the battery into useful work. That's great when it come to paying to fill up - it costs 1/4 to 1/5 as much to drive an EV as it does to drive a combustion car. But when winter results in a 10% drop in efficiency, after applying it to the part of the battery energy used for useful work, efficiency drops from 90% to (0.9 * (1 - 0.1)) = 0.81, or 81%. This is now a 9% drop in efficiency - three times as much as we saw with the combustion car. Which means that an EV with a range of 300 miles becomes an EV with a range of 273 miles, a noticeable difference.
Don't Forget the Heater
When you turn on the heat in a combustion vehicle, the car simply redirects some of the waste heat from the engine into the passenger compartment. But an EV simply doesn't create enough waste heat. Most EVs use a resistive heater. They're nice because they provide instant heat - no need to wait for a motor to "warm up" before you start feeling some warm air. But these heaters use battery power, which further reduces vehicle range.
Enter the Heat Pump - With Additional Cold-Weather Tricks!
The Model Y incorporates a heat pump. These are much more efficient than resistive heaters, allowing you to heat the cabin of a Model Y without using much battery power. Indeed, Tesla isn't the first company to add a heat pump to an EV - Nissan added one to later versions of the Leaf. But heat pumps generally only work well down to about 20° F (-7° C). Below these temperatures, heat pumps are supplemented by resistive heaters (again, like the Nissan Leaf).
But Tesla has incorporated several tricks to keep their heat pump working efficiently even when temperatures drop well below freezing. Their heat pump can grab waste heat from the motors and batteries instead of just from the outside air. While the motors and battery don't produce enough waste heat to heat a cabin directly, they can produce enough to allow a heat pump to continue operating efficiently, even when the outside temperature is much too low for traditional heat pumps. With this trick (and several others), the Tesla Model Y is now the BEST EV for cold weather climates!
Tesla Model Y: Free Supercharging
For a limited time, order a Tesla Model Y using the following link, and you'll also receive 1000 miles of free Supercharging.
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