I recently had a brief chat about the Space Shuttle, the Challenger disaster, and the concepts of risk, safety factors, and complexity from an engineering perspective.
The problem with the EV fiasco in Chicago is how the EVs were being driven as if they were ICE. The Superchargers were treated as "gas stations" where one would fill then drive days and return when empty. And then there was an unexplained mass outage in Chicago, some say ice in the charging connector. No where else but Chicago. But these empty Teslas could go no where else. When an EV is charged at home every night even if only 1/8th of a charge, this sort of thing doesn't happen. Night is the correctest time to charge an EV, when there is a 50% generating capacity surplus. Easy money for the utility. Up to 250kW per EV instantaneous demand during daytime hours at fast DC chargers is the worst time for the utility. As for cold weather power EV power consumption, ICE has same problem just not as much. The EV uses power heating the battery to keep it healthy. EV heat is not "free" as with ICE.
All that is rational, but we're in a post-rational time span when it comes to EVs. These are growing pains, which would be shrugged off without comment if EVs weren't being pressed upon us. But instead, people go "aha!" and declare the EV a non-starter (pun intended).
“Electric Vehicles (EVs) are nifty technology, with a lot of up-side potential. They accelerate like gangbusters. They are simpler, and thus theoretically easier to maintain. They are quiet. The presence of a giant onboard battery opens up a myriad of possibilities. I'd consider getting one, some day, as a second car.
But, they are "not ready for prime time." Real world problems like what was just experienced in Chicago's recent cold snap aren't fully understood or vetted, because no amount of analysis can substitute for reality. Monday morning quarterbacking aside. Not enough units have been built, not enough miles have been driven, and not enough years have elapsed.
They may also, like the compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL) was to LEDs, be a bridge technology to hydrogen fuel cell cars (or something else).”
The problem in Chicago is not isolated to just Chicago, but anywhere it gets bitter cold and you're attempting to charge the battery outside. The fast chargers cannot condition the battery to receive a charge when the battery is that cold - indoor charging presumably doesn't have this problem, if the garage is a sufficiently warm temperature. That's the way Tesla explained it.
Anyway, to Peter's point - the early adopters are getting squeezed and government won't be there to bail them out of this problem. That they created.
The problem with the EV fiasco in Chicago is how the EVs were being driven as if they were ICE. The Superchargers were treated as "gas stations" where one would fill then drive days and return when empty. And then there was an unexplained mass outage in Chicago, some say ice in the charging connector. No where else but Chicago. But these empty Teslas could go no where else. When an EV is charged at home every night even if only 1/8th of a charge, this sort of thing doesn't happen. Night is the correctest time to charge an EV, when there is a 50% generating capacity surplus. Easy money for the utility. Up to 250kW per EV instantaneous demand during daytime hours at fast DC chargers is the worst time for the utility. As for cold weather power EV power consumption, ICE has same problem just not as much. The EV uses power heating the battery to keep it healthy. EV heat is not "free" as with ICE.
All that is rational, but we're in a post-rational time span when it comes to EVs. These are growing pains, which would be shrugged off without comment if EVs weren't being pressed upon us. But instead, people go "aha!" and declare the EV a non-starter (pun intended).
“Electric Vehicles (EVs) are nifty technology, with a lot of up-side potential. They accelerate like gangbusters. They are simpler, and thus theoretically easier to maintain. They are quiet. The presence of a giant onboard battery opens up a myriad of possibilities. I'd consider getting one, some day, as a second car.
But, they are "not ready for prime time." Real world problems like what was just experienced in Chicago's recent cold snap aren't fully understood or vetted, because no amount of analysis can substitute for reality. Monday morning quarterbacking aside. Not enough units have been built, not enough miles have been driven, and not enough years have elapsed.
They may also, like the compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL) was to LEDs, be a bridge technology to hydrogen fuel cell cars (or something else).”
The problem in Chicago is not isolated to just Chicago, but anywhere it gets bitter cold and you're attempting to charge the battery outside. The fast chargers cannot condition the battery to receive a charge when the battery is that cold - indoor charging presumably doesn't have this problem, if the garage is a sufficiently warm temperature. That's the way Tesla explained it.
Anyway, to Peter's point - the early adopters are getting squeezed and government won't be there to bail them out of this problem. That they created.