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Comment by krater23 | Hacker News Reader

>Spoken by someone who's never had their diesel fuel begin gelling in the fuel line at night on a frigid, remote highway and trying to figure out if you can make it to somewhere with heat before you stop completely.

I don't know where you live, but here in Germany my diesel car had no big problems with -19°C around 10 years ago. Biggest problem was heating the interior that the windows remain ice free during driving. I want to see your new electric car driving in this circumstances the 100km I had to drive.

And please note, 2035 means 13 years in the future. I don't doubt that the infrastructure for electric cars can work in 100 years...but what's with 13?

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my diesel car had no big problems with -19°C

It depends on the formulation of your diesel. If you had a tank of "summer diesel" it would be gel at that temperature. Generally the supply chain starts changing the formulation as the weather gets colder and everything is good until you get to arctic temperatures. But if you fill up at a station that doesn't sell a lot of diesel and they still have summer diesel and its an early cold spell, or you are driving a vehicle you don't fill often, you can be in trouble. There are also additives you can add on your own if you know you have summer diesel.

Just yesterday I drove 75km in -22C, parked outside all day, then back home the same distance in -19C. Took my Model Y from 80% to 12%. No problem with heat either (that's part of why it used so much charge). I was a lot more worried about sliding off the road than running out of battery...

I believe you that it's no problem for a diesel. But it's no problem for electric either.

What if you wouldn't make it home and have a night outside? Two times 75km and down to 12% charge is not inspiring confidence in such situations!

When I left for the second drive, the car's navigation app estimated I'd have 13% left when I arrived, and the estimates have been impressively good so I just went for it.

But I also was in a good sized metro area with a couple Tesla superchargers not far off my route, so my backup plan was to stop at one for 15 minutes if it ever looked like I might not make it.

What would have happened if there is a road closure and you need to drive extra 20kms? Or a traffic jam that would make you wait one hour?

20km is less than what he has left of charge. If the detour is earlier in the drive. He could have gone to a supercharger. If he gets stuck in a jam for hours, it makes no difference. The car hardly uses any power when standing still, it will heat the cabin but other than that it uses no power. I've tried this myself, I once got stuck in double digit cold for around an hour in a model 3 outside Hamar. It made no difference to my range.

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