The true typical motorway range of the latest electric vehicles is up to 50% lower than advertised figures, new research has revealed. Neil Winton, who carried out the research, has written up his findings for Forbes. Here’s an excerpt.
New buyers of EVs need more information. Current range data rarely mentions speed, but it assumes about a 55 mph average. Tesla CEO Elon Musk admitted this to me at a Geneva Car Show press conference in 2016. It’s true that at this speed, EVs are very efficient. It’s only when high speeds are held for long distances that a big problem emerges. Particularly for buyers in mainland Europe, where the autoroute speed limit is often 130 km/h, i.e., 81 mph. (It’s 70 mph in the U.K.) So it makes sense to be honest about range at these speeds, not least because it will be severely cut.
The Lexus RZ 300e (£54,595/$71,350 after tax) for instance claims a range of “up to” 297 miles, but the battery only filled to an average 224 miles. In autoroute cruising mode the range was slashed by 39%.
The Peugeot 3008e (£49,650/$65,000) claimed a range of 326 miles. This was repeated daily, but because of other wild results, which included an autoroute penalty of at least 50% and unconvincing explanations from Peugeot, it can’t be taken seriously. (Peugeot has been asked to comment.)
The Kia EV9 (£77,025/$100,000) battery averaged consistently around the claim of 313 miles after six refills, but the penalty was 50% on the autoroute.
The Hyundai Ioniq 6’s (£55,735/$72,800) battery filled up to an average 270 miles compared with the claim of 384 miles, a 30% shortfall, while on the autoroute the penalty was 38%.
This www.wintonsworld.com data for each vehicle are the result of each being driven for a week over the same country roads and motorways in similar conditions. The data shows autoroute and battery inadequacies on more than 30 other EVs.
These negative results shouldn’t be a surprise because of the basic science.
Emmssions Analytics CEO Nick Molden put the problem this way.
“Air resistance (drag force) is proportional to the square of the speed. Drag will correlate (negatively) with range. So range will decline more than proportionately as speed increases. Vehicle design can change other factors, such as the coefficient of drag (Cd), which is why Tesla has focused so much on aerodynamics,” Molden said.
“All other things being equal, the drag force will be 164% higher at 130 km/h than at 80 km/h (50 mph) which is a speed increase of 63%,” Molden said.
Peter Wells, Professor of Business Sustainability at Cardiff Business School has summed up the problem like this.
“Range falls off a cliff at high speed. For an electric car, the extra energy required getting from 60 mph to 75 mph is astonishing and virtually doubles energy consumption to move all that air out of the way,” Wells told me in an interview a couple of years ago.
Worth reading in full.
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There are no lies when you’re saving the planet.
That’s physics for you.
While the current trend appears to be that of ignoring reality when it comes to “decarbonisation”, physics didn’t get the memo, it appears.
This is Physics O Level, not even difficult
It’s actually more A-level to undergraduate kind of level, where the 4th power relationship of drag to airspeed is examined.
I’m thinking squared..not fourth? Velocity doubles, drag quadruples?
Nor economics.
What is the autoroute penalty?
Is the “drag force” 164% higher or 1.64 times the other measure. 164% more means 2.64 as much and the distinction is not semantic.
Well it’s clearly 164 percent of the drag at the lower speed. The author should not have inserted the superfluous word ‘higher’ in there, for semantic effect, because it causes confusion to people of a precise frame of mind. Your 164% more, would have come 264% higher, for the pure sensationalism of it all.
Is this the same for petrol cars. Miles per gallon are also typically some theoretical best case performance that does not reflect the average real word use case.
Physics is physics, no matter what fuel your car uses…
ICE cars have to publish mpg using a standard formula. If they don’t report them for fraud.
As far as I can see battery car makers just lie.
Inevitably because the energy density of batteries is much lower than petrol or diesel.
Energy density of the best batteries is MUCH lower – one fourteenth that of diesel.
My ICE car returns pretty much what the manufacturers claim.
Isn’t far worse than described as drivers are advised to not charge past 80% when out and about as the last 20% takes hugely longer to get in the battery than the first 80%; and it’s not really advised to go below 20%, not least to reduce stress level. So doing 80mph while heading down to the South of France you’ll be getting 50% of 60%, i.e. 30% of advertised distance!
Then try turning the aircon on and see what happens to your range.
At typical speeds on our M roads (apart from the longish stretches with low values in parts of Wales), aerodynamic drag is roughly two thirds of the total, with the rest being rolling resistance. I guess that many EVs are fitted with tyres that achieve the lowest grade (grade A) as well, so as to get the best results on test. That makes them do well on urban duties, and of course it’s even worse at higher speeds, with the proportion between rolling resistant and aerodynamic being widened out.
EVs ”The hype, the myth and the smoke and mirrors”
Many people in the UK still trust the Government to know what it is doing and believe that in the end they will all have an electric car and carry on as normal. In my view nothing could be further from the truth and the reality, as Bob Dylan once put it;
Clouds so swift, rain won’t lift
Gate won’t close, railing’s froze
Get your mind off wintertime
You ain’t goin’ nowhere
Many current motorists will never have an EV, given current technology, the UK cannot have as many EVs on the road as there are currently petrol/diesel (ICE) cars. For those that do have an EV, for many it will just be a low range utility vehicle for local travel and even then rather than own it you may well just hire it out via a local community car scheme. The whole idea of EVs is that for most of us hoi-polloi we are not supposed to be going anywhere very much.
The majority of EV sales are corporate sales via leasing deals and already we are seeing the alarm bells ringing with the corporate users and the leasing firms as the costs of EVs spirals way beyond the costs of ICE cars. Depreciation on EVs is incredible and cannot be sustained for private users and now it seems not for corporate users either. Many are now saying that EVs are increasingly being seen as a one user disposable commodity item much like a toaster, except that they are a lot more expensive than a toaster! If this analysis is correct? EVs will increasingly be for a very elite group and if they ban and restrict ICE cars then increasingly, for most of us, it will indeed be a case of, ”You ain’t goin’ nowhere”.
And this is before the recent suggestion that battery size be reduced by 30%!
“New buyers of EVs… “
Are there any?
I don’t think too many people don’t know that the quoted range of BEVs is fictional, and actual ranges are much less and diminish with the number of recharge cycles. There’s a load of information (aka misinformation) on the web about this.
It might just be why nobody is buying them.
We all knew this ‘market’ was dead a good few months back, when even the likes of Porsche won’t accept nearly new EV’s as trade ins… it’s not quite ‘buy one ev get one free’ quite yet, but can’t be far away…
The MacMaster channel on YT was quite educational in that respect. He has a Taycan and can’t wait to see the back of it.
I also understand that Porsche have brought out a new GT3 RS, which has a waiting list. One prospective buyer was told that to access the waiting list he would need to have bought three Taycans.
Bet that’s a tempting offer. Quite enjoyed some of Lee and Geoffs videos, however the click bait is too much on Lee’s own videos now
£77K for a Kia?!
Whenever I see an EV I always try and goad them into driving faster. I have this vision that as a result they run out of “juice” before they arrive at their destination! Just my way of helping the cause.
0-60 record times… but usually spotted on the m4 doing 55 and being a mobile hazard to trucks and other traffic, eeking out the miles…
I love spotting the charging stations as the EV’s speed through the desert landscape
Hold on, aren’t there who knows how many compensation claims going through courts with any number of ambulance chasing so called lawyers promising people thousands of pounds in their pockets even if they knew someone who owned a diesel car, let alone owned one themselves. All this because Volkswagen tweaked the tyres they used on a rolling road to publish a theoretical mpg and pollution level for their cars. Where are the same massive compensation claims being advertised for these lies or is it okay for EV manufacturers to lie but not petrol and diesel?
The physics must apply to ICE vehicles as well. Your gas mileage goes down but not nearly as precipitous. So there has to be something else with battery technology that is causing a 30% drop in range. Perhaps it is the rate of discharge which does not apply to ICE vehicles that is affecting this. I have read that the rate of charging can deteriorate batteries if done at too high a rate so maybe the rate of discharge is also damaging. Batteries are the weak spot of EVs.
Mainly energy density I believe – an electric motor itself is super efficient. The issue is diesel and petrol are amazingly dense and convenient energy stores