The Expert Podcast

Here's a factor of electric vehicles that may not have been considered for the security of ownership. What happens if you get into an accident with an electric vehicle? And I'm not talking about "is the battery gonna blow up, is it dangerous?" Those are all things that have been covered before. But if you get in an accident with an electric vehicle, the battery is an integral part of the structure of the vehicle. The battery is basically the floor of the vehicle. It extends from each door sill left to right all the way to the edge of the vehicle, usually front to back between the axles, and it's within the subframe or unibody of the vehicle. Sometimes the battery itself is structural.

So if a vehicle is in an accident — even a minor accident — by definition that battery may be damaged, physically damaged. It may be bent. It may have some of the cells that are broken open. The structure around it may impact and pierce into the battery. It's kind of like most accidents today on gasoline vehicles do some damage to the subframe. It gets wrinkled, the floor gets wrinkled, the fenders get pushed in. They're very minor repairs because if your fender gets bent, you just buy a new fender and slap it on. If your subframe gets bent, you basically strap it down, put a hook on it, and pull it with a winch and straighten it out. If your suspension gets pushed in, you pull the suspension out.

What happens if the battery is damaged? How do you fix that? You can't just straighten out the battery. The battery has to be replaced. Now, replacing a battery is not as simple as replacing a fender. The battery is the whole structure of the floor of the car. You basically have to take out the whole bottom of the vehicle and then replace all the battery cells. Different vehicles have different procedures for this. Some vehicles — it's compartmentalized, it's structured, it's like a component that you can plug in place. Some of the vehicles don't have that ability. Some vehicles, it's actually what holds the vehicle together.

Separate from that, even if the battery itself is not physically damaged by impact or pushed in, is a collision or an impact on the vehicle damaging to the battery just from the vibration or from the sudden shock to a battery? Can a battery be shocked and be damaged without an impact? Can you, like, for example — you know your cell phone? If you drop your cell phone on the floor from six feet, it might damage the internal components. Does the same thing happen with a battery?

Because if a battery in a vehicle has the same level of shock absorption... Look, even if you get in a front-end collision at 20 miles an hour and it jars the vehicle — like you might have a sore neck, right? In whiplash. And your arm might hurt, and your, you know, your shoulder might hurt. What does it do to the battery? The battery might be more delicate than you. It's got electrical components. It's got different chemicals and fluids in it. How will an impact affect a battery, and will a minor collision result in that battery not being good?

Why does that matter? Well, unlike a gasoline vehicle, the battery is the vehicle. Almost all of the value of that vehicle is in the battery. You need the battery to run the vehicle. You know, if you get in an accident where somebody t-bones you or hits you in the back, you can fix the vehicle — it usually doesn't affect the engine. The engine is pretty robust on a gasoline vehicle. That engine is — you're not going to be damaged by, you know, a shock, an impact to it. That breaks things, yes, but a shock to it externally is probably not going to damage the engine.

What about an EV battery? I don't know the answer. I don't know if manufacturers have standards for this. But if you are in an accident — 25 miles an hour, somebody rear-ends you — there's a shock to the vehicle. They fix the bodywork, they fix the sheet metal. Is that going to degrade the performance of your battery in a year, two years, three years? What if it happens later? Can you still put an insurance claim? Is it under warranty? Are these types of damages now just passed along to the vehicle owner?

If the car still starts and runs, they might not think there's a problem with the battery.

Let us know what you think in the comments. Is this a risk for electric vehicles that's not being accounted for?