Mercedes electric car breaks 1,000km charge barrier

Mercedes has unveiled an electric car that it claims can travel more than 1,000 kilometres on a single charge in an attempt to convince customers that a lack of charging infrastructure need not be a barrier to buying a battery-powered vehicle.

The range, which far exceeded the industry average of about 300km, was calculated using internal digital simulations of real-life traffic conditions.

However, the German manufacturer said a road-legal version of the Vision EQXX, which will be shown off in the spring, will be capable of covering almost double the distance of a fully charged Tesla Model S.

Model

The car’s “toolbox”, which was developed with the help of Mercedes’ champion Formula One and Formula E teams, will be used in a compact model similar to the A Class, the Stuttgart-based automaker added.

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The vehicle will be available from 2024 or 2025, but will probably not have the full range of the prototype. Instead, it will utilise the density of the battery in the EQXX and solar roofs to make a more efficient and lightweight car.

“All the elements that we see in this car will make it into series production,” said Markus Schäfer, Mercedes’ chief technology officer.

“Probably we don’t need all this range in a compact car, but now we can downsize the battery, we can have even a much smaller battery than we see here in the EQXX. . . this means lower costs in the vehicle.”

Last year, Mercedes launched an electric version of its classic saloon, the EQS, which is capable of travelling more than 650 kilometres on a single charge. The battery pack in the Vision EQXX has 50 per cent less volume and is 30 per cent lighter than that in the EQS, the company said.

Mercedes is not the first to claim that it has cracked the 1,000km barrier. In November, China’s Guangzhou Automobile Group unveiled the Aion LX Plus, which it claimed could drive more than 1,000km on a single charge.

Advances

But the company said its technological advances would underpin a number of small and medium electric vehicles in the coming years, and that the breakthrough showcased the strength of its supercar engineering arms.

Mercedes, which has pledged to be an electric-only brand by 2030 if the “market conditions allow”, has come under fire for its ownership of a Formula One team, whose cars run on fossil fuels.

The fact that several components of the EQXX, such as the inverter, were developed with racing teams proved “that innovations from motorsport, where powertrains are already highly electrified, have immediate relevance for road-car development”, Mr Schäfer added. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2022