Does cold weather diminish EV battery life?

[RSpanner]

A local news cast here in Oregon reported today ( a Auto Mechanic ) said that the cold weather we are having ( down to 18-20 degrees F. at night ) will take years off of the battery life. I have never heard this and am kind of pissed of that a TV station would run such a story. Any validity to the report?

 

[israndy]

That sounds wrong, if you charge a battery below ~32°F it will cause battery damage, but that means all EVs should arrive with smarts enough to sense the battery temps and charge around that. It's possible that some manufacturers are not checking the batteries well enough, sure the exterior surface is above freezing, but how about the deep interior? One reason to use 18650s in the early EVs as the interior is very close to the exterior.

Time will tell, but certainly Tesla has put in the work to show that they work all over the world for years and years.

 

[RSpanner]

Yeah, I don't know why they use a mechanic who has a shop that works on ICEs' making statements about EV batteries. Slow newsday maybe but typical of the reporter on that station, usually only tells one side of a story.

 

[GtiMart]

He might be basing his experience on 12V lead-acid batteries. These don't do so great in very cold weather, they don't last nearly as long. EV high-voltage batteries don'T suffer the same fate, there's an intelligent Battery Management System (BMS) that protects the battery, limits charging and discharging depending on temperature etc. You can't just transfer that experience.

 

[E90alex]

Heat is worse for battery degradation than cold.

Cold just limits the chemical reactions from taking place so you have temporarily reduced charging and discharging capability until it’s warmed up.

 

[techno79]

All of my cell phones and even my old walkmans back when I was in school would all get damaged when the weather was a little cold.

I post this bit of sarcasm to make a point. The biggest epidemic in American life today is people saying the most random things without a clue, never saying I don't know, and most of the time, the statements are so absurd, you wonder how they were never called out. Because it doesn't take an expert to debunk any of it. No matter the topic.

 

[Adopado]

A local news cast here in Oregon reported today ( a Auto Mechanic ) said that the cold weather we are having ( down to 18-20 degrees F. at night ) will take years off of the battery life. I have never heard this and am kind of pissed of that a TV station would run such a story. Any validity to the report?

Your BS detector is working well ... as far as your Tesla goes this is nonsense.

 

[RichAZ/CapeCod]

Cold = Good (batteries simply less efficient till they get some "heat")

Heat = Bad (batteries more efficient, up to a certain level of temperature (mid-90s??) otherwise "heat" is not good for long-term battery life)

Rich