I have always known that the heat will effect mileage of electric cars, or any car with air conditioning really. However, as usual, experience is a good teacher. Now that it has been hitting 95 degrees daily lately it is becoming a great deal more obvious. For this reason, the wife and I have started waiting longer before we go out.

At the end of each trip, my EV Nissan gives me a report on how many miles per KW hour I had. It is pretty normal to score anywhere from 3.0 to 3.8. However, here lately, I have been getting reports around 2.3 and 2.4. It is somewhat logical as it takes half the 5 mile ride to cool the car down.

On rare occasions, when driving at night, I get reports close to 5.0. Then the other day, in the evening, I needed very little air conditioning. It wasn’t so hot and my trip was about half in the shade. When I pulled into the drive and turned off the car, I was surprised with a 6.1 miles per KW Hour.

That tells me, I would get much better mileage if I could do all my driving in a climate of 72 degrees where the sun is not heating the cabin through the windows.

Well, I have also drawn a few more conclusions. I could drastically increase my mileage if I could always park my car with the windows wide open. If I could leave the air conditioning off, I just might be able to double my range.

I can’t imagine that others are not completely aware of what I am saying. Moreover, air conditioning does create a load on internal combustion engines, too, likely more than we want to admit. Might it be possible that AC might cost as much as 5 or 6 miles per gallon. This is particularly true when a car must be parked in the sun, pushing the cabin heat to 130, maybe 140 degrees. Likely that compressor in any car is kept running the first 3 or 4 miles.

In the old days, we just rolled the windows down which helped a lot. We just can’t do that anymore. Weather aside, too many thieves. Too much of a temptation. The cost of insurance is high enough. However, If the cost of fuel keeps going up, we might need to roll the windows down anyway and make sure we leave nothing in the car we don’t want to lose.

There are other solutions of course. I did many years ago cover my car with a reflective cover. It worked okay, but by the time I took it off the car, the sun already heated the car. Besides, someone took the cover.

My wife is always tell me, I think to much. I guess that’s true. I did consider just a couple of 4 x 8 pieces of plywood with aluminum foil. I almost did it a time or two. I also wondered if I might be able to mount the things on the car while driving. I am sure it would drive the cost of AC down, but I’m not sure it would be legal.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a piece of foam that would fit over the car and hang over the windows a little. That would not only protect from the heat but it would also prolong the life of the interior, maybe a little. The foam could be rolled up while not in use and put in the trunk. I kind of like this idea the most, if I could find a piece of foam. It would not help while driving. However, it would not take as long to cool the cabin.

My car, I guess as most cars with AC allow the driver to select to recirculate the interior air or pull in fresh air and cool it. Many overlook it. When the cabin is 120 degrees, it is better to draw 95 degree air in and cool it instead of the hot interior air, while forcing the 120 degree air out.

On the other hand, once the interior of the car has cooled blow the 95 degree outdoor temperature, it is far better to cool the interior air than the the hotter outside temperature.

My car has all kinds of automation, but I must do this manually. Moreover, I must only guess. I have no interior temperature indication, other than guess. With all the push to go green, why is this so. Nonetheless, I do my part. When I get in my car, I select outdoor. After about 5 minutes, I switch to recirculate. My guess, I’m probably off some.

Another more recent Idea I had is to get one of these battery powered leaf blowers. Roughly five minutes before going anywhere, I can roll down the front windows and point the leaf blower in one window and blow 95 degree in one window forcing he 120 degree air out the other window. I haven’t done it yet, but it does seem that it would work.

Then the blower would go in the trunk for just before I start home.

If anyone has any other ideas, I have my ears on. If the engineers don’t want to solve this problem, let’s do it for them. Incidentally, Old Joe is going to make sure we are all going to go to electric cars. Y’ll are going to be facing these problems one of these days.