[Porsche-O-Phile]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

"Can a Volt (or Tesla Model S) REALLY last an hour or two in hellish stop-go commuter traffic in the middle of winter when it's 10 degrees outside and you absolutely need to run heat, defrost and lights / wipers to avoid getting killed? Can it be counted on to be reliable enough to get you through blizzard conditions during an emergency without risk of literally freezing to death in your car when the heat goes out? These are real issues for some people and some of them live not that far away from here. I'm just wondering if they're "real" or if they need to be only kept around and used as a supplement to a conventional internal combustion type vehicle."

I can't speak for a Tesla, but a Volt would be better under those conditions than an IC car. An IC is sitting there using it's fuel reserves to keep a useless engine running. A Volt only uses as much energy as is required to run the heat, AC, or wipers. The AC when running constantly uses 2 kw. There are 10 kwh available from a full battery. So the AC would run continuously for 5 hours, or more reasonably it would cycle on and off for many more hours. Then the ICE would fire up and the same system would be gas-powered, as in a conventional car. Same with the heater.

Thanks - I wasn't aware there was a standby source of power / hybrid type solution (thought these were 100% battery only so thanks for dispelling my ignorance and shedding some light on things).

Enjoy!