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Comment by doctoboggan | Hacker News Reader

My sister lives in Chicago and her ICE car also won't start due to the extreme low temperatures. The Canadians solved this problem by having resistive heat elements installed in their engine, I think EVs probably need the same.

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They do, there are resistive elements on older Teslas and heat pumps on newer ones. The trouble is - they require electricity to operate and so they suck the battery dry. In this case it sounds like charging stations also bombed out...

The ICE cars also need electricity for their resistive heating blocks, so the EVs aren't worse off in that regard.

> The trouble is - they require electricity to operate

If only the charger could supply elecricity. Oh wait...

Tesla replaced the resistive heaters in their vehicles with a heat pump. When it's super cold they run (essentially) DC power through their AC motors so the motors don't spin, they just heat up. The heat pumps then scavenge heat from the motors.

It's resistive heat, but not a resistive heat element.

*Not a "dedicated" resistive heating element (obviously the motor doubles as a resistive heating element). Also below a certain ambient temperature, heat pumps with heating elements run at approximate the same efficiency as the heating element itself. None of this is bad design though, if the ambient temperature is a bit higher than the minimum temperature, you would then get additional COP from the heat pump.

Even in Canada the gas pumps froze over and ICE cars are unable to fill gas.

https://calgary.citynews.ca/video/2024/01/12/gas-pumps-freez...

Same in Illinois but the article doesn't mention it https://www.wcia.com/news/local-news/cold-weather-causes-fro...

Block heaters are extremely common in colder climates - upper midwest of the USA, Alaska, central Canada, etc. You can identify them when you see a vehicle with an electrical cord stub dangling just below the front bumper or in front of the grille. In fact, during my road trips through Alaska and Canada I frequently saw power outlets in front of parking stalls at hotels so that guests could plug in the heaters overnight.

I learned to drive on a 1976 VW Rabbit diesel. We had a block heater for it, and in the winter, we had to plug it in to warm it up. You'd think there'd be some way to do that for EVs.

> You'd think there'd be some way to do that for EVs.

You would, and you'd be correct. Many or most EVs do have this.

There is.

In Europe, most Euro 6 diesel engines have have heaters as they are so efficient, they do not heat up fast enough for the coolant to flow properly.

heat lamp under the car and a tarp over the hood.

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