A road-legal electric car has just covered more than 1,200 km while consuming surprisingly little energy.
Volkswagen calls it Mission Efficiency. This four-seat prototype is not intended for sale, but several of its components are close to production. Its motor and electrical architecture are based in particular on the MEB+ platform planned for future models from the brand. The goal is simple: go farther without installing an ever-larger battery.
Credit: Volkswagen AG
To achieve this, the engineers mainly worked on the air. At high speed, a car uses a great deal of energy to push the air in front of it aside. Mission Efficiency therefore features a highly streamlined body, a sealed underbody and specially designed wheels to limit these losses. Its drag coefficient reaches 0.158, a record value announced for a road-legal vehicle.
The result can be seen directly in its consumption. During an ideal test at a constant speed of 68 km/h, with no inclines or air conditioning, the prototype used 6.48 kWh to travel 100 km. This measurement provides a benchmark, but it obviously does not represent an everyday journey.
Volkswagen therefore completed a much more meaningful route between Wolfsburg, Germany, and Vienna, Austria. The car covered 1,278.36 km in real-world conditions with an announced average consumption of 6.89 kWh/100 km, excluding charging losses. Only one recharge was carried out during the trip.
The Volkswagen Mission Efficiency seen from the rear three-quarter angle on the road. Its highly tapered rear section and covered wheels limit aerodynamic turbulence.
Credit: Volkswagen AG
To put this into perspective, many production electric cars consume significantly more on the road. Here, each kilowatt-hour makes it possible to travel around 14.5 km. The performance therefore does not come from a huge energy reserve, but mainly from reducing losses and using an efficient drivetrain.
This approach changes the way range is considered. Adding cells increases the amount of energy available, but also the mass that must be moved. A body that moves more efficiently through the air can, by contrast, reduce energy needs during every kilometre. The benefit becomes especially significant on long trips, where air resistance plays a major role.
The prototype nevertheless remains a rolling laboratory. Its very low and highly streamlined shape requires design choices that are difficult to reproduce on all family vehicles. Volkswagen says, however, that some of the technologies used are compatible with mass production. They could therefore gradually find their way into future electric models based on the MEB+ platform.
The next step will be to determine precisely which gains can survive the transition to a car produced in large numbers. Mission Efficiency will not be commercialised, but its aerodynamic and electrical solutions are already serving as a test bed for the next generations of Volkswagen vehicles.