Will This New Tech Cool and Heat Your Next Car?

• Hyundai and Kia are showcasing new approaches to controlling interior and exterior temperatures in cars.

• A nano cooling film developed by the automaker could reduce interior temps by as much as 54 degrees Fahrenheit.

• The EV age is forcing automakers to develop new approaches to managing extreme temperatures inside and outside vehicles, as it can be a significant drain on range.

Every summer when we inevitably face the challenge of cooling off a car interior to avoid third degree burns, it can seem like one of those problems that is beyond the reach of modern science and will remain so until some breakthrough in the 23rd century. And the sea of black plastic that still comprises the dashes of most new cars doesn't seem particularly helpful in this regard.

Thankfully, the EV era has brought with it a newfound focus on temperature management in cars after decades of automakers largely engineering their way around these issues, or inadvertently making things worse through design. And this is happening largely because air conditioning or poor heating tech tends to be a major drain on battery power.

Hyundai and Kia have given the topic of temperature management in vehicles a new look, with a handful of promising technologies, including a nano cooling film that can reduce interior temps by as much as 54 degrees Fahrenheit.

One of the film's layers reflects solar energy, while another emits mid-infrared wavelength. Like traditional tints, the film works by blocking infra-red radiation from outside the car, while also permitting heat to escape from the inside.

Hyundai and Kia have tested a batch of identical cars, with one group left in original state while another received the nano film, and noted that vehicles without the film recorded a temperature of 119.3 degrees, vehicles that received the nano film only showed a temperature of 96.8 degrees.

But passive cooling isn't the only tech that can conserve vehicle energy. The automaker is also working on a Radiant Heating System that could conserve up to 17 percent more energy to reach a required temperature.

The system emits radiant heat in the direction of the passengers’ legs, and uses a a high-temperature film-type heating element that can reach a temperature of 230 degrees Fahrenheit.

While this sounds, ahem, like a scary number, the heating element itself is wrapped in a fabric material that produces infrared rays, and also includes a burn prevention system.

One of the promises of this new system is being able to significantly extend the driving range of an EV in the winter, the automaker says.

"Alongside the vehicle’s existing heating system, the Radiant Heating System could conserve up to 17 percent more energy to reach a desired temperature, also saving time to reach this condition; the system delivers warmth to the lower body within three minutes, greatly enhancing passenger comfort," the automaker notes.

The third temperature-related technology the automaker is developing is metal-coated heated glass that can quickly remove moisture or frost from the windshield of a car in the wintertime.

The best part, especially if you have a vehicle right now with tungsten wires in the windshield, is that the metal-coated glass is actually invisible and doesn't mess with your vision's depth of field. And it can also block at least 60 percent of solar energy, helping keep the vehicle cool in the summertime, which is perhaps even more useful than its winter heating ability alone.

"The 48V system can completely defrost the glass surface within five minutes at -18°C [-0.4°F], up to four times faster and consuming around 10 percent less energy compared with conventional air-conditioning systems," the automaker notes.

As you've no doubt guessed by now, blasting hot air at a car's windshield can be a drain on an EV's range, and is not a particularly 21st-century approach to the problem.

Now, if the sun's energy could also be collected by the entire exterior surface of the car, instead of just some small solar panels on the roof, and be used to boost EV range, this might actually decrease range anxiety.

Will we see meaningful advances in interior cooling tech over the course of this decade, or will new cars largely remain subject to older A/C features in the near future? Let us know what you think in the comments below.