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by russell_h 854 days ago
Is there really much room for improvement on efficiency without moving to very different form-factors?

I would have figured that rolling resistance and air resistance account for the huge majority of the energy usage without much room for improvement over eg a Model 3, unless you make it look like an F1 car or give it solid tires or something.

1 comments

Right now some of the Model 3s are leaders of the pack, at 130+ MPGe. I expect some gains are possible, but yeah, not a ton in the current incarnation of cars.

But it's something I feel like should be at forefront of mind. Competitors should be trying to get to top of pack, but very few are >120 MPGe.

Also it should be more obvious that big E-SUVs, even if they have big range, are actually joule hogs. Seeing a 70 MPGe should be a turn off.

And if we do change architectures? The Aptera has been talking about a 337 MPGe system for a while. It's an incredibly impressive idea, but only if people have the context to understand relative efficiency versus other EVs. We need to be building the base knowledge to evaluate, to appreciate wins, and to keep car makers from regressing.