Slashdot Mirror
Challenging Tesla, Volkswagen Announces Electric SUV, Mass Production of Electric Vehicles (apnews.com)
An anonymous reader quotes the AP:
Volkswagen is planning to release a fully-electric SUV in China which could compete with Tesla's Model X. The German automaker said Sunday the ID. ROOMZZ will be unveiled at the upcoming Shanghai Auto Show and will be available in 2021. Volkswagen says the zero-emission vehicle can go approximately 450 kilometers (280 miles) before the battery has to be recharged.
Volkswagen also claims it will have "level 4 autonomous driving," Reuters reports, adding that this electric SUV "is the latest move in Volkswagen's aggressive growth strategy in China, where electric cars are given preferential treatment by authorities..." In fact, the company's chief executive says nearly half of VW's engineers are working on products for the China market, though the electric SUV will eventually be shipped to other markets. "We plan to produce more than 22 million electric cars in the next 10 years."
VW's head of e-mobility also tells Reuters that Volkswagen will convert eight of their factories to mass produce electric Volkswagens, and eight more factories to to mass-produce electric cars under a different brand.
Volkswagen also claims it will have "level 4 autonomous driving," Reuters reports, adding that this electric SUV "is the latest move in Volkswagen's aggressive growth strategy in China, where electric cars are given preferential treatment by authorities..." In fact, the company's chief executive says nearly half of VW's engineers are working on products for the China market, though the electric SUV will eventually be shipped to other markets. "We plan to produce more than 22 million electric cars in the next 10 years."
VW's head of e-mobility also tells Reuters that Volkswagen will convert eight of their factories to mass produce electric Volkswagens, and eight more factories to to mass-produce electric cars under a different brand.
Congratulations, Tesla/Elon Musk! Mission success !
Volkswagen is planning to release a fully-electric SUV in China which could compete with Tesla's Model X.
Let's see. No pictures, no specs, no prototypes, going to announce it and have it for sale within 18 months but not in any of the mature car markets against ICE competition. But we're supposed to believe it will be a direct competitor to the Model X. Riiiiight... Sounds like vaporware and marketing bullshit to me.
The German automaker said Sunday the ID. ROOMZZ will be unveiled at the upcoming Shanghai Auto Show and will be available in 2021.
Seriously? They named it "ROOMZZ"? That sounds like a cell phone from 15 years ago or a sound my daughter would make to imitate a car noise.
Volkswagen also claims it will have "level 4 autonomous driving," Reuters reports, adding that this electric SUV "is the latest move in Volkswagen's aggressive growth strategy in China, where electric cars are given preferential treatment by authorities...
Yeah yeah, talk is cheap. Tesla is selling very good EVs today. VW isn't - their current offerings are unimpressive. Their Audi and Porsche subsidiaries are promising cars with promising specs but I can't buy them today. All I'm hearing from the traditional automakers is a bunch of weasel word promises that rarely seem to result in a car I can buy. When they do make one it's almost always a pathetic compliance car which won't appeal to the general public.
I own a Chevy Bolt EV which is a good car but it came out 3 years ago and GM hasn't meaningfully updated it or come out with another EV of note since and that doesn't look likely to change any time soon. Ford hasn't sold an EV of any description. Toyota is busy with the delusion that hydrogen fuel cells are the future. Nissan has the Leaf which isn't as good as the Bolt EV much less any Tesla and nothing else. BMW has the remarkably ugly and overpriced i3. Most of the EVs you can buy are little ugly hatchbacks with pathetic range and poor performance. (see Nissan Leaf, Honda Fit EV, BMW i3, VW Golf EV, etc)
VW is talking a lot of shit about EVs after getting their hand slapped over lying about their diesel products. Two questions come to mind. 1) since they lied about the diesel products, why should I believe anything they claim about electric ones? 2) Where are the vehicles they keep promising? They say they are investing all these billions of dollars with no cars to sell and yet Telsa has been selling cars to the public for about a decade now. If I was a shareholder I'd be pissed. Say what you want about Tesla and all their faults, at least they are actually making cars that people want to buy and not just a marketing hand job to pretend like they care about EVs.
Immediately contradicted by the subsequent line that says "concept car". I'm sure they'll release "something" eventually.
Place your bets that like every single other "electric SUV" apart from the Model X, it's simply a moderate-sized 5-seater with "SUV styling".
I too name vehicles after letters that I draw in Scrabble.
Don't strain yourself with the rush there, VW.
Ignoring the constant stream of "actual range being vastly less than the promised concept range" vehicles that we've been getting from European automakers, China measures ranges on the laughably lax NEDC cycle that gives grossly inflated range figures.
A technology which VW is a clear leader in ;) (/snark)
Speaking of that, they're already back to their old ways, trying to cheat the new WLTP standards. This time, the cheat is just the opposite - trying to make their emissions look bad, so that their reductions targets over the coming years will be less stringent. So they've been doing things like testing cars with depleted batteries and disabled engine start-stop systems to make the cars burn more and emit more.
Please try harder than you've tried previously.
Anchor: "We take you now to our Chief Meteorologist, Paris Hilton." Paris: "It's hot." Anchor: "Thank you."
Not a VW of course, but tow-rated EVs do exist: Rivian is the example that comes to mind;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
5-ton towing capacity, 400+ miles non-towing so depending on *what* you're towing and where, at least 200+ miles. Pretty respectable TBH. Estimated base price ~$68K (without EV rebates) which is pretty competitive given the performance numbers.
=Smidge=
are these real 450km or is that they wishful thinking again?
we all know VAG is a bit generous with numbers...
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Their diesel NOX scandal took years off people's lives. NOW they have the perfect combo of large population base, thriving market and regime in which VW are most comfortable to exploit. The VW solution doesn't make a dent in pollution, smog or improve China's air quality but they need a life line.
Glad its not our turn again.
For a smaller manufacturer focusing mainly on the cheaper half of the market, like Ford, it is hard to justify large investments in EVs not (yet) bought by their typical customer that won't be profitable for some years.
Are you seriously describing Ford as a small manufacturer? Ford is one of the 5 biggest automakers on the planet. They are huge by any reasonable description.
Ford make their money selling affordable B and C segment cars and margins are razor thin.
What are you talking about? Ford makes their money selling large pickups and SUVs. You clearly haven't looked at their financials statements. They lose money (and lots of it) on smaller passenger cars which is why they recently announced they were getting out of that market segment.
They have also lost a lot of market share because of uncompetitive products and questionable reliability and now Brexit is threatening the one market where they are reasonably successful, so I can imagine large investments in EVs are not the top priority at Ford.
The UK market is NOT a big market for Ford and Brexit only really matters to them insofar as it affects the global economy. Ford only sold about 375K vehicles in Britain in 2018 versus about 6 million vehicles sold worldwide. Any company that is not investing heavily in EVs already is playing a very dangerous game where they are basically hoping the technology will fail.
They will get to it when the EV market is more mature.
Any company that waits that long will almost certainly lose massive market share. They won't be able to get batteries at a competitive price and their technology will be one or more generations behind the curve. Playing wait and see is a huge risk when it comes to a technology shift like we are seeing with EVs.
found the guy that paid too much for tesla stock.
Cute. Of course I'm on record multiple times here on slashdot saying that I wouldn't touch TSLA with a barge pole. WAY overvalued. The company is a good company but the stock price lost any tether to reality some time ago. That has nothing at all to do with the quality, capabilities, and popularity of their cars. They are already the top selling luxury car maker in the US, outselling BMW, Mercedes, Lexus and Audi. In fact they sell as many cars as BMW and Mercedes combined in the US. That doesn't happen by accident.
stock that will nosedive with traditional automakers getting into the game, hardcore... with their massively larger manufacturing capacity and a century of automotive manufacturing experience over their upstart competition that's still operating like a 'start up' instead of a legitimate contender, and run by a buffoon that can't keep his fucking mouth shut.
I work in the auto industry making wiring for both ICE and EV automobiles. While the big auto companies are quite capable in many ways as you say, they also by and large have no idea what to do about EVs and they aren't taking them very seriously to date. We make parts for the Chevy Bolt EV and I've seen first hand their project management and it's not impressive. They are trying very hard not to cannibalize their current car sales and in the process they are failing to invest in the future of cars which increasingly appears to be EVs. They haven't invested seriously in battery tech, they aren't making big investments in EV infrastructure, most of the EVs they have made have been half-assed compliance cars with shitty range and poor features. Explain to me how you think they are going to suddenly magically figure out the formula for making a good EV without actually making any. How are they going to compete with Tesla or other companies that invested early when they have a substantial advantage in battery cost and supply and performance?
It's not too late yet for the big auto companies to get in the game but they had better do so fairly soon. (soon meaning serious products within the next 5-10 years with big investment starting NOW) If they wait much longer than that, they'll have basically ceded big market share to Tesla and any other car maker that does take EVs seriously. When EVs reach a tipping point there will be some big auto companies that take the train to bankruptcy-ville if they aren't working hard on EVs now.
the changes that happened in the fallout of the 'emissions scandal' is the best thing to happen to the industry since the assembly line.
I hope you are right but I doubt it. VW is run by some seriously ethically challenged people. They knew what they were doing was wrong and did it anyway. Same people who green-lit the diesel scandal are in charge today. No reason to believe they have suddenly learned how to be ethical or that they seriously care about EVs. I'd be happy to be wrong but there is little evidence to suggest I am to date.
Slashdot I'm in and done with in minutes. A video you have to watch the whole thing, at the speed they want to go not you.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
What we really need are advances in battery energy storage.
They'll happen but it's going to take time. The good news is that batteries are already more than good enough that we could switch many/most cars from ICEs to EVs today with only modest changes to habits and infrastructure. Basically if you have a garage and don't need to routinely travel longer than 200 miles in a single trip, you can switch to an EV today.
No more IC engines, and cars can be redesigned from the ground up better using space that the engine, fuel delivery, and exhaust systems once took up.
I don't think ICEs will ever go away completely but I can see a day when they are a rarity or at least a minority. That's going to take a few decades to get to however. There are some use cases where ICEs just make more sense than pure EVs. But even the ICEs that remain I think will mostly be electrified because it will make economic sense to do so.
If we can get the energy per unit volume within an order of magnitude of gasoline, propane, or other fossil fuels, transportation would be radically changed.
You are measuring the wrong thing. What matters is usable energy/power per kilogram for the whole drivetrain. You are making the mistake of comparing the energy content of a volume of gasoline with the energy content volume of a battery but that's a flawed comparison. Gasoline is useless without a very large and very heavy engine to turn it into useful work. Just using the volumetric energy content of gasoline doesn't tell you anything really useful because the liquid does nothing by itself. You need to know how much the whole system weighs, how efficient it is at turning that energy into useful work, and how much it costs to do that. While there are some limitations and caveats, existing EVs today already have substantially better fuel economy for a given power and weight output for a wide variety of use cases. My Chevy Bolt EV has more torque than my pickup truck, vastly better fuel economy, comparable range (about 238 vs 275-320 miles) and only weighs about 300kg less. A Telsa Model X actually weighs more than my pickup and has more power, more torque, FAR better fuel economy, comparable range, etc.
And the good news is that battery technology is going to continue to get better. ICE technology is close to as good as it will ever get. An ICE produces more heat than it does useful work and there is no way to change that. Given that EVs are already matching or exceeding ICE performance in many cases and have lots of room to improve as battery tech improves, the future seems dim for ICEs in the long run.