Patent ID: 8626381

Claim:
A method of increasing a range of a vehicle by decreasing trapped HVAC energy at an end of a trip, the method comprising the steps of: (a) determining and storing a destination list based on locations where the vehicle may be parked in the future, the destination list accessible by a control module in the vehicle; (b) determining HVAC reduction regions around each of the locations on the destination list, the HVAC reduction regions accessible by the control module; (c) operating a HVAC system while the vehicle is moving; (d) tracking the location of the vehicle relative to the locations on the destination list; and (e) the control module automatically reducing the energy usage of the HVAC system when the vehicle enters one of the HVAC reduction regions, wherein step (e) is further defined by the vehicle not reducing the energy usage of the HVAC system due to the vehicle entering one of the HVAC reduction regions unless the vehicle has traveled for a predetermined minimum amount of time since the most recent vehicle startup.