OPINION
Greg Offer
Nine years ago I wrote a paper when I came to the
conclusion that plug-in-hybrids were the optimum
powertrain and I even made the prediction that this decade
is going to be the battle of the range extenders and plug-in
series hybrids. It hasn’t worked out this way, but why not?
The automotive industry seems to be at a point of
divergence where the majority of companies are having to
place their bets on either fully electric such as Tesla,
Renault, Nissan, BYD; PHEVs such as BMW and Mitsubishi,
or even hydrogen fuel cells in the case of Toyota and
Hyundai. A few years ago it was possible for companies to
hedge their bets and wait and see, but now with
alternatively powered vehicles moving into the mainstream
the volumes are increasing and the investments required
are making it too expensive to make multiple bets.
Each region also seems to be following a di erent
path. China has gone full on electric for the last decade,
and this has paid o , giving it a
commanding position in the
lithium-ion battery industry. The
rise of BEVs is likely to continue,
but something else is needed for
longer distances or heavy goods
vehicles so PHEVs and fuel cells
are seeing a resurgence of interest.
In the USA, BEVs seem to be
winning despite longer driving
ranges needed outside cities. GM
BMW can now off er an electric p ow er option to al l
its buyer demog raphics
Global OEMs are
having to focus on their
own region and
place their bets
is cancelling the production of
the Chevy Volt and focusing on BEVs, building upon
the success of the Bolt EV. The financials for OEMs
also don’t work, as the extra costs of the more
complicated engine plus battery drivetrain can’t
compete against the long-term predictions for cell
costs when mass-producing millions of BEVs.
In Europe, the CO
targets will be felt from next
year, creating a di erent situation to the rest of the
world. There is a good chance that the rollout of
infrastructure is too slow to support enough BEVs,
and this will make PHEVs the only option for European
OEMs to meet their fleet targets. For example the
Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV produces 46g of CO
per km
WLTP compared to the old diesel version achieving
44 // July 2019 // www.electrichybridvehicletechnology.com
139g/km, explaining why Mitsubishi and others are no
longer selling diesels in Europe OEMs therefore need to
have gasoline PHEVs and BEVs as a significant percentage
of their fleet sales, and soon. BMW saw this coming way
before everyone else, which is why it is in a commanding
position with the most PHEV models, and the ability to pivot
quickly with pure BEVs if it needs to.
In Japan, Nissan has led the way with BEVs, but Toyota
failed to capitalize on this when it said they wouldn’t
produce a pure electric vehicle in 2011 just when Tesla,
Nissan and BMW made their move.
Toyota is now playing catch up,
however is still leading the way in
fuel cells, which combined with
Japan’s strong pro-hydrogen
economy drive, could pay o in
the long run.
Overall, it looks like each major
region will end up developing its
own particular solution over the
next decade, with a playing field
tilted by policy makers to favor their
own OEMs strengths. In contrast, global OEMs are having
to focus on their own region and place their bets, whether
BEVs, PHEVs, HEVs or FCEVs as they can no longer a ord
to o er every solution as they scale up and the costs
increase exponentially. However, in the long run it is likely
one system will prove to be more e icient or attractive to
the customer than others, and slowly take over in the other
regions. Hence it is almost guaranteed there are going to
be some big winners and some big losers over the next
decade or two.
Dr Gregory Offer is a Reader in mechanical engineering at
Imperial College London. His research focuses on battery,
fuel cell and supercapacitor technologies, mainly in transport
/www.electrichybridvehicletechnology.com