Wondering if any years of the Escape Hybrid have the ability to run the air conditioner off the hybrid battery all night with the gas engine kicking on to recharge the Hybrid/HV battery when the HV battery gets down to a certain level. This is now a common practice with the Toyota Prius and is known as "Hotel Prius".

I have a Lexus RX400h (Hybrid) and although it does this, the hybrid battery will run the A/C for about 6-8 minutes followed by a similar 6-8 minute run of the gas engine. That, compared to a Prius with a healthy hybrid/traction/HV battery that is said to run the A/C for 30+ minutes followed by a gas engine recharge of the HV battery taking only a few minutes (I have read reports of 30- seconds to 5 minutes )

I believe I have read that some years (early) of the Escape hybride can only run the A/C with the gas engine.

 

The 2010+ have an electric compressor and should work similarly to the Prius.
'09 and earlier have a belt driven compressor and would run the ICE any time the A/C is needed.

Important to keep perspective on the capacity of the hybrid battery. It's not much at all. Your RH400h is actually larger than the FEH, i.e., 240 cells * 1.2V * 6.5Ah = 1.87kWh. FEH is 250 * 1.2 * 5.5 = 1.65kWh

Tales of the Prius are exaggerated. The length of time the A/C can be run depends on the heat load. If it's only maintaining a temperature, it can run longer. The Prius battery is only 1.31kWh, and it only uses a small fraction of this when "cycling" the battery for A/C purposes. A 100% healthy battery (full capacity) can run A/C full blast for 10 minutes from "full" (80% charge). After that it will cycle on and off roughly equally every 2-3 minutes to maintain full blast A/C.

The accounts you read were likely extremely mild conditions where the compressor was not running or only running periodically, and the blower fan was using the bulk of the juice.

Even just sitting in ready mode with the A/C off, the 30min/5min cycle is barely do-able.

 

Thanks for responding to my question. Sounds like I might have to try camping in my Lexus and see how it goes. I did my tests over the course of an hour, on 90 degree plus evenings. I did notice that the gas engine run times got a bit shorter once the interior itself cooled off. I currently generally have to drive to New Mexico or Colorado (from central Texas) if I want to escape the summer heat for camping. Have been thinking that hybrid A/C at night might be a game changer.

 

It will cost you $ and wear and tear. Check your oil regularly. The frequent thermal cycling of the Atkinson cycle engines makes them prone to oil consumption.

 

In the case of the Toyota Prius, this feature has been referred to as "Hotel Prius," and as you mentioned, it can run the air conditioner using the hybrid battery and periodically start the gasoline engine to recharge the battery as needed. However, not all hybrid vehicles have this exact feature, and the behavior can vary depending on the specific hybrid system and model year. The behavior you described for the Lexus RX400h and the Prius is consistent with this principle.