By Tom Krisher and Mark Thiessen
Associated Press 

Electric vehicles drain batteries faster in the cold - that's a problem in Alaska

 

March 15, 2023

AP Photo/Mark Thiessen

Stretch Blackard, owner of Tok Transportation in the Interior Alaska town, with an electric school bus on Feb. 2. The temperature stayed below zero much of the day.

Alaska's rugged and frigid Interior, where it can get as cold as minus 50 Fahrenheit, is not the place you'd expect to find an electric school bus.

But here is Bus No. 50, quietly traversing about 40 miles of snowy and icy roads each day in Tok, shuttling students to school not far from the Canadian border.

It works OK on the daily route. But cold temperatures rob electric vehicle batteries of traveling range, so No. 50 can't go on longer field trips, or to Anchorage or Fairbanks.

It's a problem that some owners of electric passenger vehicles and transit officials are finding in cold climat...



For access to this article please sign in or subscribe.

 

Reader Comments(0)

 
 

Powered by ROAR Online Publication Software from Lions Light Corporation
© Copyright 2024

Rendered 03/28/2024 18:38