With the latest South Korean fines and news around Tesla’s range in cold weather, the company has taken to YouTube to highlight one of their innovative design features that will help save range in winter driving conditions.
Tesla’s YouTube channel released a short video detailing the engineering and benefits of the Tesla Heat Pump and Octovalve.
The Heat Pump was first introduced on the Model Y. However, it now comes standard on all Tesla models, including the S, X and 3.
The Tesla Heat Pump can draw excess heat from the powertrain to speed up Supercharging speeds and improve driving range in cold conditions.
Heat pumps are not new, but Tesla has re-engineered the traditional heat pump to a sleeker and more efficient design.
The Tesla version of the Heat Pump uses a printed circuit board to combine heating and cooling into one sleek box. As well, instead of adding an extra valve to transition between heating and cooling, Tesla engineers designed an octa valve to do both.
According to Tesla, the Heat Pump adds around fifteen to twenty per cent more efficiency, which does lead to a longer range.
The video comes at the same time as both Audi and VW are no longer including heat pumps in the Q4 e-tron and ID.4, with both automakers citing semiconductor shortages as the reason.
You can check out the video below via Tesla’s official YouTube page.