Mitsubishi is an example of anti-consumer, poor design decisions
Mitsubishi bizarrely deleted the battery heater in their 2023/2024 PHEV Outlander. They also have no 12V traditional lead/acid battery, unlike most hybrids.
As you cannot charge such battery pack in cold temps (around -20C or below), without damaging it permanently, no battery heater means no juice to start the PHEV engine. Mitsubishi's answer to this is "keep it inside in the winter", which oddly presumes one has a heated garage.
This is made even more absurd, as Mitsubishi even advertised that there was still a battery heater, and kept that information on its website for more than a year, even when people complained. Loudly.
There are cases of those who bought said models, parking them outside (as most Canadians do), only to discover they are bricks in the winter for months at a time. It should be noted that ICE cars do not have this problem of course (unless they are broken), and PHEV and pure battery cars solve this issue with a battery heater. Mitsubishi is entirely alone with this model, a problem they created by deleting the battery heater.
Some who happened to have a heated garage, would drive to the grocery store in -30C temps, come out and find their car now dead. The firmware, sensibly, prevented any draw from the battery pack to prevent damage, and with no juice, no anything. And even if you could start the engine, as there is no lead acid battery, there is no temp storage for juice. The car is simply not designed to operate this way.
Mitsubishi has released a firmware update, where they constantly charge/discharge the battery when plugged in. This does not solve the obvious technical problems in any real way. (If it did, every company would be doing this)
All other hybrids and battery only cars on the market deal with this sensibly in some way. All of them. Except Mitsubishi and their absurd deletion of the battery heater. This is a 100%, hands down, Mitsubishi created problem, hence the class action law suit against them.
But let's look at another problem case with Mitsubishi.
I have a friend who is about to go on vacation for 2+ months to the south. This is not a rarity, for example 2 million Canadians, and a load of Americans living in the US North head south for the winter for months at a time.
Thus one thing you do is set your heat to 5C. Maybe 8C.
This keeps plants from dying, keeps water pipes from freezing (people watching over the house may need water for the plants, or to use the bathroom when there). There are a variety of other reasons to keep the house above 0C. And -40C(turning off the heat) is not the same as 5C.
Mitsubishi knows this.
Every furnace known to Canucks goes down to eat least 10C, if not 5C. Every thermostat. My current heat pump has a setting for 10C, which I find "high" but usable, thus validating that 17C is not a purely technical limit, and my friend has a new system.
Let me repeat this. My friend's central air, Zuma system with backup electric heat pump, only goes down to 17C.
This is an economic issue. I save 2000 dollars setting my heat to low temps for 5 months vs 21C. But it's also an environmental issue, because setting your heat to as low as possible makes sense.
Cold temps are not gone in Canada each winter, winters have been milder in some regions. Milder, not -20c is gone. Climate is a yo-yo, and only incompetent companies would make such decades-long design decisions. People buy furnaces for 20+ years use, cars often for a decade of use, and even if sold, will be in play in the used market for years beyond that. The next 5 years could see Jan-March -40C temps where I live, no one knows.
So a warning to people buying Mitsubishi products. Very anti-consumer by selling products into markets they should not be. Very anti-environmental, for the same reasons.