Passing the ocher plateaus of the Bardenas Reales Natural Park in northern Spain, Roel Grooten gave me a hand to get my foot off the accelerator.
The car continued to roll down the open stretch of road, its speed only slowing down slightly. “It continues,” said Grooten, the chief engineer of the Dutch car company Lightyear, as we strolled through the lunar landscape. “What you feel is nothing that slows you down. You feel the aerodynamics, you feel the low rolling resistance of the tires, the bearings and the engine.”
This streamlined design is what the company attributes to allowing it to enter a space for a long time overlooked by most car manufacturers. Already in November, the company will begin delivery of what it describes as the “world’s first solar car ready for production”: the Lightyear 0, a € 250,000 (£ 215,000) sedan covered with 5 square meters of curved solar panels that are recharged. the electric battery while the car is driving or parked outdoors.
“If we had the same amount of energy we collect in these panels in any other car that uses three times the amount of energy to drive, it will become useless. It becomes a very expensive trick,” Grooten said. “You have to build this car from scratch, to make it as efficient as possible, to make it feasible.”
Under optimal conditions, solar panels can add up to 44 miles a day to the 388-mile range the car gets between loads, according to the company. Tests conducted by Lightyear suggest that people with a daily commute of less than 22 miles could drive for two months in the Netherlands without having to connect, while people in cooler climates such as Portugal or Spain could last up to seven months.
Under optimal conditions, solar panels can add up to 44 miles a day to the range of 388 miles the car gets between loads. Photography: Nacho Bueno Gil / The Guardian
But it remains to be seen whether the company’s commitment to the lot will pay off, said Jim Saker, professor emeritus at Loughborough University and chairman of the Motor Industry Institute.
“You have to pay a lot of money and have solar panels stuck in the car for just an extra 44 miles. The question mark right now is the fact that it’s actually worth it? The real concept isn’t bad. It’s only if the technology is really viable to make it economically sustainable for anyone who wants to do it. “
Sales of the Lightyear 0 would likely be limited to a handful of first-time users, he added. “But it’s not really a commercial proposal right now.”
Others questioned the idea of a car being promoted as a lifeline for the deepening climate crisis. “The most sustainable way to approach car ownership is to actually avoid it completely, if you can,” said Vera O’Riordan, a doctoral student who focuses on low-carbon roads and policies. for passenger transport at University College Cork in Ireland.
While electric vehicles may play a limited role in rural areas that do not have public transportation, he cited research suggesting that these vehicles are often sold to high-income households in urban areas. “So you have to ask yourself the question: are you serving this individualized transport, very inefficient, very harmful and that induces traffic in urban areas where otherwise you could find yourself perfectly with public transport and walking and with bike?”
The need to move away from cars to deal with the climate emergency is, perhaps surprisingly, echoed by Lex Hoefsloot, the CEO of Lightyear, 31, who has raised about 150 million euros in investment to put -o on the go.
“It would be great, I totally agree,” he said. “But I don’t think we’re going to change our lives too much. Maybe, when we’re really panicking in 20 years, we could. But in the meantime, we have to work at it.”
Since 2016, the company has been advocating solar energy as a key part of this solution, imagining solar cars capable of running on clean energy and accelerating the transition from polluting fossil fuels. “People said it wasn’t possible, mostly because of the limited amount of solar energy that could be obtained in a car,” Hoefsloot said.
Roel Grooten, the chief engineer, explains the car controls. Photography: Nacho Bueno Gil / The Guardian
His own experience, however, suggested otherwise. The Lightyear 0, a sleek four-wheel drive, has its roots in a squatting wheeled box that carried four college students in helmets through the interior of Australia to win their class in the global solar challenge of 2013.
“If it works in Australia, it works everywhere. That was the thought,” said Hoefsloot, who founded Lightyear with four other members of the solar challenge team. “In the early days, I have to admit that there were doubts about whether we should go to the manufacture of complete cars, because we all know it’s not the easiest thing. But there was no one else who was really willing to do any something like that.
In recent years there has been an increase in interest in integrating solar panels into cars: Mercedes-Benz recently unveiled its plans to equip an upcoming electric car with solar panels on the roof, while Toyota has sometimes offered solar panels of limited capacity as a complement. to its Prius hybrid.
Next year, Munich-based Sono Motors plans to launch a 28,500-euro family-assisted solar car, while California-based startup Aptera Motors said in 2020 that pre-orders for its futuristic vehicle Three-wheel solar electric sold out in less than 24 hours. .
With months to go before the production of the Lightyear 0, there are still problems to be solved, from a rigid steering wheel to the buzz that sometimes fills the car when the air conditioning is activated.
Once in the car, there’s little about the driving experience that feels different from other electric cars: “That’s a great accomplishment, that’s what we aim for,” one staff member tells me, except one little reminders about constant dripping solar power. One screen shows exactly which cells are feeding on the sun at any given time, while another quantifies how much solar energy is being absorbed.
The body panels of the car are made of reclaimed carbon fiber. Photography: Nacho Bueno Gil / The Guardian
In an effort to use as much of this solar energy as possible, the wind-swept design avoids the side mirrors of the cameras and works with light electric motors glued to their wheels. The body panels are made from reclaimed carbon fiber and the interiors are made from vegan leather of plant origin with fabrics made from bottles of recycled polyethylene terephthalate.
The 20-minute test is probably the only time I sit behind the wheel of the Lightyear 0. With its high price, ideally paid for by those who have an outdoor parking space to maximize the car’s gain by the sun , it is not. a car for the masses.
Instead, the company plans production, which will offer up to 946 vehicles to deliver to Europe and the UK, as a start. “This is a small scale to validate in the world that we can produce a car,” said Telian Franken, leader of the prototyping team.
From here, the company will shift its focus to a second solar-powered electric car that aims to sell for around € 30,000 as early as 2025. “We are trying to make a difference, not for the millionaire who can allow a € 250,000 car, but to get us to the point where the average person can get off the grid, get a sustainable and reliable vehicle that will surpass any economic box you can get at the time, ”he said. Franken, citing the Toyota Corolla. or Honda Accord as examples. “That’s what we’re trying to overcome and replace because it’s not sustainable.”