It has been talked about for some time, but Mercedes has now confirmed that it has successfully broken the 1,000 kilometre battery range for an electric car. The breakthrough is very good news for smaller cars in the next two to three years.
The EQXX prototype was driven from Sindelfingen in Germany to Cassis on the Cote d'Azur on a single charge. It was apparently driven at speeds of up to 140 KPH and had 15% of charge left when it arrived at its destination. The car used 8.7 kilowatt hours of energy per 100 km on its 11-and-a-half hour drive to France - making it about twice as efficient as current Mercedes models and Tesla's longest-range car on offer, the Model S 60.
Mercedes says its 8.7 kWh for the drive compares with average consumption of 14.9 for the Tesla Model 3, 16.1 for the BMW i4 and 21.9 for Audi's E-Tron.
The battery used on the EQXX is only half the size of the battery used in Mercedes’ flagship electric model, the QS, and this means even better news for buyers of smaller cars in the future, according to Mercedes.
It is now aiming to introduce the technology into smaller cars which, it says, will halve the energy consumption of current electric cars. This is expected to happen is as little as two to three years.
Reuters reports the company’s chief technical officer,Markus Schaefer, as saying efficient design was key to maximising an electric car's range.
"First we optimise efficiency, and then we can see how many battery modules we put in the car," Schaefer said at a media roundtable, adding that customers should be able to decide the size of the battery they want based on their needs.
He said the aim was now to produce electric cars consuming as little as 10 kilowatt hours of energy per 100 km.
Reuters also reports that car manufacturers are in a neck-to-neck race to produce higher range cars that dispel consumer anxiety over the lack of widespread charging infrastructure for electric vehicles.
Automotive News reports that the EQXX’s battery features a new chemistry developed with the help of Formula One experts from the Mercedes-AMG High Performance Powertrains division in the UK.
