Why Tesla LFP Batteries Are More Environmentally Friendly

February 14, 2022

By Cliff Rice

Back in August of 2021, we compared NCA (lithium nickel cobalt aluminum oxide) batteries with LFP (lithium iron phosphate) batteries - "Tesla's LFP (iron) batteries compared. Which one should you buy?". NCA batteries had been the standard for all Tesla models in the USA, but Tesla’s plans to switch to LFP in Model 3s and Model Ys prompted that article. Tesla even offered more rapid delivery to customers waiting for the cars they had on order if they decided to get their car with LFP batteries.

A nickel mine in Indonesia

There are trade-offs between these two battery types in terms of weight, range, consequences of carrying a full charge, regenerative braking, and cold weather behavior which are all discussed in the column mentioned above. These are all valid considerations, but working from the assumption that a prime motivation of most people buying an electric car is to promote a healthy environment and a healthier planet (by cutting CO2 emissions), it should also be mentioned that these two battery chemistries have vastly different implications for the environment. Crucially, NCA batteries are built with a lot of nickel (about 18 kg in a Tesla) whereas LFP batteries have none. But high demand for nickel for Teslas (and many other electric vehicle models) is accelerating strip-mining in Indonesia and the Philippines. Mining is one thing, but strip mining is more problematic.

Strip mining on tropical islands in Southeast Asia is especially harmful because these are centers of biodiversity with large numbers of unique species of plants and animals, many of which are endangered - some critically so. Unlike forest clearing, where the land retains some value for agricultural production, strip mining obliterates what is there and it will likely be decades, if not centuries, before such areas are productive again. When not rainforests, this strip mining is destroying agricultural land. Plus, Southeast Asia has high rainfall, so once the land is laid bare, erosion carries large amounts of sediment onto nearby coral reefs.

Details matter, however, and in this case it should be pointed out that nickel is mined from two sources - laterite and sulfide. Laterite deposits (as in Indonesia and the Philippines) are formed by the weathering of ultramafic bedrock in areas of high seasonal rainfall, along ridges and mountain shoulders. Through leaching, nickel accumulates 10-25 m below the surface and the only way to get at it is to clear off the top 10 m and everything living there.

In contrast, sulfide deposits are in the bedrock and nickel is extracted by hard-rock mining, sometimes near the surface, but often far underground. This distinction is important for electric vehicles because sulfide deposits are smelted into the highly pure nickel which is required for batteries. When laterite nickel is smelted, the lower purity nickel primarily goes to other uses, such as stainless steel. However, if laterite nickel is processed by High Pressure Acid Leaching (HPAL), nickel of sufficient purity for batteries is produced, but at present not very much is produced this way. Of the other uses of nickel besides for batteries, some processes also need high purity nickel, but some can use either high or lower purity nickel. Another important point is that there are not likely prospects for increased production of sulfide nickel, whereas there are extensive areas available for mining laterite nickel.

This may all seem convoluted, but what this all means is 1) as consumption of sulfide nickel for batteries grows with the expansion of the electric vehicle market, this will take up more and more of available sulfide supplies; 2) processes which can use either will hence shift to laterite nickel. Thus, while some may point out that electric vehicle batteries, for the most part, do not use laterite nickel and hence are not the cause of the expanding strip-mining occurring in Indonesia and the Philippines (and in a few other places such as Venezuela and Brazil), it is nevertheless true that additional demand for laterite nickel is a consequence of vehicle batteries taking an increasingly large portion of the available sulfide nickel.

Despite much press coverage last year, Tesla's transition to LFP batteries has only made it to the Model 3 Rear Wheel Drive model (in the USA). Other models may get LFP batteries in the future, as they have in Europe. So, buying a Tesla is a great way to contribute to the decarbonization of your personal transportation, but to avoid the harmful impacts of high-nickel battery chemistries, lithium iron phosphate (LFP) is the best, even if you have to be selective as to which model you get.

Is Tesla Planning to Add Steam Support to All Vehicles?

December 11, 2024

By Karan Singh

Not a Tesla App

Yesterday, we reported that Tesla updated their Steam integration on Model S and Model X vehicles. The update was part of their 2024 Holiday Update, but it looks like there may be more to this than a simple update.

Steam, a video game library app, makes it easy for users to buy or launch games on their computers. However, a couple of years ago, Valve, who created Steam, launched their own standalone device, the Steam Deck. The Steam Deck runs a custom OS based on Linux.

Steam Launch

When Tesla launched the redesigned Model S and Model X, Tesla introduced a dedicated gaming GPU with 16GB of RAM and touted the ability to play top-tier PC games in Tesla vehicles.

In 2022, Tesla finally launched the Steam app for the Model S and Model X as part of its 2022 Holiday Update. The Steam app runs Steam OS, the same OS as the Steam Deck in a virtual environment.

However, earlier this year, Tesla stopped including the GPU and Steam (Beta) in their vehicles, and we haven’t seen any updates to the Steam in quite some time. In fact, we thought Tesla was axing their gaming-on-the-go dreams.

SteamOS Update

The Steam app, which is still in Beta, is getting an interesting update for the Model S and Model X vehicles with the discrete GPU.

Those vehicles received an update to SteamOS 3.6 - the same version of SteamOS that runs on the Steam Deck. While nothing has visually changed, there’s a long list of performance optimizations under the hood to get things running smoother.

Comparing Steam Deck to Tesla Vehicles

Let’s take a look at the Steam Deck - according to Valve, its onboard Zen4 CPU and GPU combined push a total of 2 TFlops of data, which is fairly respectable, but much lower than today’s home consoles. The Steam Deck is capable of 720p gaming fairly seamlessly on low-to-medium settings on the go and is also built on the AMD platform.

AMD-equipped Teslas, including the Model 3 and Model Y, are packing an older Zen+ (Zen 1.5) APU (processor with a combined CPU and GPU). AMD claims that the V1000 - the same embedded chip as on AMD Tesla vehicles (YE1807C3T4MFB), brings up to 3.6 TFLops of processing power with it, including 4K encoding and decoding with the integrated GPU on board.

While that’s not enough for 4K gaming or comparable to a full-blown console or desktop GPU, that’s enough raw horsepower for light gaming and is currently more powerful than the Steam Deck.

The Model S and Model X’s GPU brings that up to about 10TFlops of power - comparable to modern consoles like the Xbox Series X at 12 TFlops.

Steam Gaming for All Vehicles?

The fact that Tesla is updating SteamOS even though the feature is no longer available in any new vehicles could indicate that Tesla is not only bringing Steam back to Teslas but that it’s going to play a much bigger role.

While SteamOS is run in a virtual environment on top of Tesla’s own OS, we could see Tesla bring SteamOS to all of its current vehicles, including the Model 3, Model Y, and Cybertruck. Steam in these vehicles would likely support any game that’s capable of running on the Steam Deck.

We think this Steam update, which includes performance improvements and a variety of fixes, has quietly passed under most people’s radars. This could be a very exciting update for those who enjoy gaming, especially for those who love to do it in their Tesla.

Tesla Holiday Update Weather Features: All the Small Details

December 11, 2024

By Karan Singh

Robert Rosenfeld / YouTube

As part of Tesla’s 2024 Holiday Update, Tesla included two awesome new features - Weather at Destination and the long-awaited Weather Radar Overlay. These two features are big upgrades built upon the weather feature that was added in update 2024.26. The original weather feature added an hourly forecast, as well as the chance of precipitation, UV index, Air Quality Index, and other data.

However, this update also added some smaller weather touches, such as the vehicle alerting you if the weather at the destination will be drastically different from the current weather.

Not a Tesla App

Weather At Destination

When you’re navigating to a destination and viewing the full navigation direction list, the text under the arrival time will show you the expected weather next to your destination. You can also tap this, and the full weather pop-up will show up, showing your destination's full set of weather information.

Note the weather under the arrival time

Not a Tesla App

You can also tap the weather icon at the top of the interface at any time and tap Destination to switch between the weather at your current location and the weather at your destination.

You’re probably considering that the weather at your destination doesn’t matter when you’re three hours away - but that’s all taken into account by the trip planner. It will add in both charge time and travel time and show you the weather at your destination at your expected arrival time.

And if the weather is drastically different or inclement, such as rain or snow, while you’ve got sunshine and rainbows - the weather will be shown above the destination ETA for a few moments before it tucks itself away.

Tesla also recently introduced a new voice command. Asking, “What’s the weather?” or something similar will now bring up Tesla’s weather popup.

The weather pop-up above the ETA

Not a Tesla App

One limitation, though—if you’re planning a long road trip that is more than a day of driving, the weather at destination feature won’t be available until you get closer.

Weather Radar Overlay

As part of the improvements to weather, Tesla has also added a radar overlay for precipitation. You can access the new radar overlay by tapping the map and then tapping the weather icon on the right side of the map. It’ll bring up a radar overlay centered on your vehicle. It’ll animate through the radar data over the last 3 hours so that you can see the direction of the storm, but you can also pause it at any point.

You’re able to scroll around in this view and see the weather anywhere, even if you zoom out. It also works while you’re driving, although it can be a little confusing if you’re trying to pay attention to the navigation system. If you like to have Points of Interest enabled on your map, the weather overlay will hide POIs except for Charging POIs.

Requirements / Data

Unfortunately, you’ll need Premium Connectivity for any of the weather features to work, and being on WiFi or using a hotspot will not be enough to get the data to show up. The data, including the weather radar, is provided by The Weather Channel.

As for supported models, weather and weather at destination are available on all vehicles except for the 2012-2020 Model S and Model X. The weather radar has more strict requirements and requires the newer AMD Ryzen-powered infotainment center available on the 2021+ Model S and Model X and more recent Model 3 and Model Y vehicles.