By now, most of you have heard about the winter storm in Virginia that caused a huge traffic jam along Interstate 95 that stranded some people for 24 hours. There were people who claimed that such an event would cause problems for people who drive electric cars such as our Teslas.
Virginia traffic jam
NPR
There's a guy in Michigan who owns two Teslas, a Model X with the old-fashioned electric resistance heating and a Model Y with the newer heat pump heating. He calls himself Dirty Tesla because he lives on a dirt road, and he doesn't wash his cars much. He decided to do an experiment to see how his cars would fare in a traffic jam in cold weather.
Michigan has more than its share of cold weather. He picked a night where the temperature was predicted to vary between twelve and fifteen degrees Fahrenheit. Both cars were charged to 90% at the beginning of the test, and he left them out in his yard overnight, unplugged. He set the cabin temperature of both cars to 70 degrees, and he engaged the driver's seat warmer to level 3, the warmest level.
After 12 hours, both cars were fine. The Model X had used more electricity, but both were capable of going another 12 hours of simulated traffic jam without running out of juice. The car wouldn't last as long if the traffic jam happened when the car was at a lower state of charge, but that same thing would be the case in a gas car if it were stuck in a traffic jam with less than a full tank of gas.
Some of his commenters mentioned that if there were a winter storm that cut off electric power, then electric cars couldn't charge their batteries, but, he pointed out, gas pumps work using electricity. You can't fill your gas tank if the gas station doesn't have electricity.
He mentioned that keeping the car at a lower temperature than 70 degrees would prolong the availability of battery power. He suggested 60 degrees as a reasonable temperature. That's not an issue with a gasoline powered car. Since heat is just a waste product of keeping the engine idling, you can keep the interior of the car as warm as you'd like without using extra gas. One of the things he neglected to mention is that if a gas-powered car is stopped for a long period of time with its engine running, even if it's outside, there's a danger of carbon monoxide poisoning. There's no such danger with an electric car.
Here's some wintertime advice that's appropriate for both an electric car and a gasoline powered car.
He suggested keeping a blanket in the car during the winter. I thought that was such a good idea that I ordered some emergency space blankets to keep in my and my wife's cars. You might also want to keep some food that won't spoil, such as unsalted nuts. Keeping water in the car when you're not in the car is problematic since it could freeze and crack the container, but if you're going on a wintertime trip on a limited-access highway, you should bring some water with you.
Tesla stuck in Virginia traffic
Dan Kanninen, who used to work for the EPA drives a Tesla Model 3. He was caught in the traffic jam for 14 hours. He recently wrote about his experience in Teslarati.
Mr. Kanninen watched Netflix on his touchscreen while waiting for the traffic jam to end. He was comfortable in his car. At the end of the traffic jam, his car, the lowest range Tesla M3, still had 18% charge in it's battery. His car directed him to a supercharger. On the way to the supercharger, he saw long lines of cars waiting for gas stations to fill them up.
He made the point that EV owners who charge at home start each day with their programmed state of charge. That's usually 80% or more. Drivers of gasoline powered cars often start out with less than half a tank.
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Emissions Pooling is an incentive-based program supported by various governments—most notably the European Union—to help automakers meet strict carbon reduction goals under Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards.
CAFE standards mandate that automakers reduce the average CO₂ emissions across their fleet of newly manufactured vehicles. The EU’s 2025 targets are particularly aggressive, and manufacturers risk hefty fines if a sufficient portion of their new vehicles aren’t low- or zero-emission.
Emission Pool
Emissions pooling is a regulatory mechanism that allows automakers to combine their fleet CO₂ emissions to collectively meet environmental targets. Companies with low or zero emissions—like Tesla—can partner with higher-emitting automakers to help reduce their combined average and avoid costly fines.
In practice, this means pool members purchase emissions credits from Tesla, which uses its all-electric lineup to generate surplus credits. These credits help other manufacturers offset their emissions, while Tesla earns a tidy profit.
Tesla has long capitalized on this model, regularly selling emissions credits to strengthen its financials. Now, its European Union emissions pool is expanding again—with Honda and Suzuki joining existing members like Stellantis, Toyota, Ford, Mazda, and Subaru.
Green Bottom Line
Every automaker in Tesla’s emissions pool is effectively buying credits from a company with a 100% zero-emission fleet. In Q4 2024 alone, Tesla earned $692 million from regulatory and emissions credits, making up nearly 30% of its quarterly net income.
That’s a major chunk of profit driven by programs like emissions pooling—and with Honda now onboard, Tesla gains a significant new partner (and revenue stream) in the EU.
Tesla quietly included a cabin radar in its vehicles for several years before recently activating it through software update 2025.2. Tesla now uses the interior radar for several features, and later this year will add additional features that take advantage of the interior radar.
Cabin Radar Features
The first feature Tesla developed that uses the cabin radar is front row cabin sensing. Instead of relying on sensors in the seats to detect occupancy, Tesla now uses the radar to determine where people are sitting in the vehicle. The radar is much more accurate than a seat sensor, so not only will it prevent false positives that occur when placing a heavy object on the passenger seat, but it could also improve reliability by reducing the number of parts in the vehicle.
In future updates, Tesla intends to expand the occupancy sensing to the rear of all of its supported vehicles, which will help improve vehicle safety by correctly deploying airbags as needed on a dynamic basis.
Regular Radar vs 4D Radar
The 4D radar is Tesla’s latest iteration of the radar, which is capable of even more sensing features. While many of these features are still a work in progress and haven’t been enabled, we recently covered what’s coming for the cabin radar. For now, these 4D radars are limited to the Cybertruck and the refreshed Model Y, but Tesla intends to expand the 4D radar to other vehicles as parts become available. Older vehicles include a different part number for the cabin radar, but it’s not clear if or how that will affect upcoming cabin radar features.
Upcoming Cabin Radar Features
In Q3 2025, Tesla intends to add child-presence detection, as well as health-detection for critical emergencies. In short, the radar is a safety-focused addition and will be able to help protect an individual left behind in a vehicle.
In addition to child detection, the radar will also determine passenger sizes to dynamically determine which airbags to deploy, which can help reduce airbag injuries for shorter individuals sitting in the front seats.
The radar can automatically note if a child or baby is left behind in the vehicle and will notify you via the Tesla app immediately. It will also turn on the HVAC system to ensure their safety. In the case of an emergency, the vehicle can also automatically call emergency services in some cases and even report its location.
As a reminder, while Tesla vehicles outside of the United States support eCall, vehicles within the US cannot call 911 unless a phone is connected to the vehicle via Bluetooth. We hope that Tesla looks to add similar capabilities in North America to improve safety capabilities.
Which Vehicles Have Cabin Radars?
Tesla’s more recent lineup of vehicles includes cabin radars, but this isn’t an exact science, and we’ll explain why a bit further below.
Tesla includes the cabin radar on the 2024+ Model 3 and some 2022+ Model Ys. It’s also included on all refresh Model Ys, the Cybertruck and some 2021+ Model S and Model X vehicles, however, the exact hardware version of the cabin radar does differ between models. While there are different hardware versions for the cabin radar, it’s not clear whether all hardware versions will support all features in the future.
To complicate things further, some pre-refresh Model Ys (late 2022+) are already equipped with the cabin radar, while others are receiving a notice from Tesla to come in and have the radar installed. This is due to Tesla using the radar for driver and passenger occupancy sensing.
As such, some older Model Ys and Model 3s may either be equipped with the cabin radar or may receive a notification from Tesla to have it equipped to address the occupancy sensor recall.
Model S and Model X vehicles manufactured from approximately September 2024 should also include the cabin radar sensors, but it’s best to check to be sure. We’ve got some instructions below on how to do just that.
How to Check If You Have a Cabin Radar
There’s actually an easy way to check whether your vehicle has a cabin radar. To do this, you’ll need to enter Tesla’s Service Mode, which is aimed at technicians, but it’s perfectly safe to do so as long as you exit it before driving and don’t change any settings.
If you’re not sure how to access Service Mode, check out our Service Mode guide that will walk you through the process. Once you’re in Service Mode, use the menu on the left to navigate to the Safety & Restraints section and thenchoose Seats.
You’ll be presented with the seats panel that shows passenger occupancy. Between the two front seats, you’ll see a green box below or above the virtual screen. Tap on it and it’ll either say Restraints Control Module (RCM) or Cabin Radar (ICR).
Location of Cabin Radar
Not a Tesla App
On supported vehicles, the cabin radar is located between the two front seats above the rearview mirror.
Future Features
We expect Tesla to continue to develop features that rely on the vehicle’s cabin radar. Dog Mode, for instance, could be turned on automatically if you leave your pooch inside the vehicle and fail to turn on Dog Mode. Tesla can also trigger the rear HVAC fan even when the seat occupancy sensor isn’t triggered, which happens regularly with child seats.
Tesla is also expected to stop including seat sensors in every seat and instead rely on the cabin camera to detect passengers, reducing the cost of each vehicle. As with other Tesla features, new feature ideas on how to leverage the cabin sensor will come later as owners and product owners think of other clever uses for the new hardware.
