echo64 comments on Tesla charging stations become ‘car graveyards’ as batteries die in subzero temperatures, abandoned cars left in the lot after cars wouldn’t charge

[–] echo64@lemmy.world 10 points 2 years ago (3 children)

I thought ev batteries had heating and cooling to prevent exactly this? Maybe they couldn't heat enough through the cold to get charging again?

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[–] _danny@lemmy.world 10 points 2 years ago

It's people having their battery die while they wait for an open charger.

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[–] cynar@lemmy.world 6 points 2 years ago (1 child)

It was a domino effect. When a car with a cold battery tried to charge, it had to wait for the heaters to get it up to a working temperature. This meant a 20 minute charge became 20 (initial) + 10 (heating time) + 10 (replacing extra power lost to heating). A 20 minute charge then takes 40+ minutes. The next car has the same issue. Once this happens a few times, even cars that were warm have cooled down, while queueing.

It's the EV equivalent of the petrol panics that happen to ICE cars. They idle in the queue until they run out of fuel. It's an infrastructure problem combined with people learning the limits of a new technology.

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[–] SuperIce@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago

And don't forget that this constant charging means that the supercharger's own batteries are probably depleted, limiting them to what they can pull from the grid, which IIRC is 350kW per 4 stalls. So instead of 250kW max per stall, they can now only do ~90kW.

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