Did Ophelia leave you stranded?

Falcon L

Just wondering if Ophelia left EV owners without electricity for an extended period and, if so, how you coped.

I was without power for a bit over 5 days. The nearest fast charger from me is over a half an hour drive away. Not sure how I would have managed.

goz83

I had thought about this. If there was any real risk of power loss for a period of time, I would get a generator, even if I had no EV.

There are a couple of fast chargers within 10 minutes of me, so I would be OK with the EV.

And the EV could be used as a power source apparently.

Sabre Man

I used my car to charge my phone. Got power back after about 6 hours fortunately.

Nope and wasn't that bad here, bad enough but the Storm of Christmas Eve 1997 was a lot worse in the East. Having said that it was bad enough that surprised me we didn't loose power. The ESB did tremendous work upgrading since then.

A generator is always handy to have but I'm only 5K from the carlow fast charger which could also be out of course.

unkel

I expected the power might be cut, so I charged the car on a FCP around lunchtime. Had my inverter and powercable ready. Could have run the wifi / phone and laptop chargers / TVs off the car for many days.

In the end we had no power cut at all (Dublin)

VikingG

Yes nobody considers how electric cars will function in a post apocalyptic zombie infested world....

BoatMad

Deleted User wrote: »

Nope and wasn't that bad here, bad enough but the Storm of Christmas Eve 1997 was a lot worse in the East. Having said that it was bad enough that surprised me we didn't loose power. The ESB did tremendous work upgrading since then.

A generator is always handy to have but I'm only 5K from the carlow fast charger which could also be out of course.

The east isn't just Dublin! Power cuts all down through Wicklow and Wexford. Some only back yesterday

I never said the East was Dublin, I don't live in Dublin, technically the South East.

BoatMad

Deleted User wrote: »

I never said the East was Dublin, I don't live in Dublin, technically the South East.

Parts of Wexford were absolutely hammered, Far worse then the Christmas storm

The majority of the wind actually hit the south east not Kerry ,

oppenheimer1

goz83 wrote: »

I had thought about this. If there was any real risk of power loss for a period of time, I would get a generator, even if I had no EV.

There are a couple of fast chargers within 10 minutes of me, so I would be OK with the EV.

And the EV could be used as a power source apparently.

The majority of portable affordable generators will not charge an EV without hacking them (having a bonded neutral-earth ground). You have to hack the generator to charge the battery.

I believe it voids the battery warranty to charge from a non-mains supply on the leaf anyway.

cros13

oppenheimer1 wrote: »

I believe it voids the battery warranty to charge from a non-mains supply on the leaf anyway.

Not that I'm aware of. Generators are often used to provide charging at remote locations by Nissan themselves. The onboard chargers will either clean up the power supplied into nice direct current or refuse to work.

In serious disaster situations EV owners can set themselves up to be a lot more resilient than combustion car owners.
A home battery and a few kWp of solar panels and you're laughing.
Many of the PV mounting systems used in Ireland and Scotland are rated for wind loads in excess of 200km/h, most of the panels can handle pressure differences equivalent to wind speeds almost twice that.
The largest solar farm in puerto rico lost less than 5% of their panels due to the two Cat 5 hurricanes this year and they were on the south coast and took a direct hit of Maria's eye wall.

In situations where there is less damage the electricity network operator just needs to prioritize getting rapid chargers back up (something helped by their location near MV substations) to serve large numbers of EV owners.

After all it's not like you can strike oil in your back garden and refine it in the kitchen. Most areas don't have more than a couple of days worth of refined fuel on hand, petrol/diesel pumps also don't work without power.
Unless it's stored properly with additional stabilizers added, refined fuel can only be stored for a few months.

oppenheimer1

cros13 wrote: »

Not that I'm aware of. Generators are often used to provide charging at remote locations by Nissan themselves. The onboard chargers will either clean up the power supplied into nice direct current or refuse to work.

In serious disaster situations EV owners can set themselves up to be a lot more resilient than combustion car owners.
A home battery and a few kWp of solar panels and you're laughing.
Many of the PV mounting systems used in Ireland and Scotland are rated for wind loads in excess of 200km/h, most of the panels can handle pressure differences equivalent to wind speeds almost twice that.
The largest solar farm in puerto rico lost less than 5% of their panels due to the two Cat 5 hurricanes this year and they were on the south coast and took a direct hit of Maria's eye wall.

In situations where there is less damage the electricity network operator just needs to prioritize getting rapid chargers back up (something helped by their location near MV substations) to serve large numbers of EV owners.

After all it's not like you can strike oil in your back garden and refine it in the kitchen. Most areas don't have more than a couple of days worth of refined fuel on hand, petrol/diesel pumps also don't work without power.
Unless it's stored properly with additional stabilizers added, refined fuel can only be stored for a few months.

Well that's the problem, plug a leaf onto a standard Genny, the likes you'd see on a building site and it won't work. You'll need an expensive one with a bonded supply and pure sine output to be sure it works and doesn't damage the electronics.

I'd question whether the EV is more storm resilient than an ICE. You can have 1000km in the tank and fuel can be brought the car where you can't to that with electricity.

pwurple

We just got our power back today. Longest I have ever been without power in my lifetime, even my grandparents don’t recall this kind of outtage.

Car was actually the least of my problems. Everywhere i work has chargers. Some powered from wind... laundry was the much bigger deal.

So, as well as getting my phone charged at work, i was plugging the car in too.

DrPhilG

I drove from Dublin to Donegal on the day of the storm. No issues, at least not storm related.

One of the northbound Applegreens being out of action was a pain in the hole though but that's been an ongoing issue I believe.