A new Renault Zoe with a 250-mile range – the longest of any mainstream electric vehicle – was unveiled in Paris today and will go on sale in the UK in November.
Fitted with the new Z.E. 40 battery, the latest Renault Zoe can now cover twice the distance delivered by the model at the time of its original launch.
In real-world driving, Renault estimates the new Z.E. 40 battery has a range of 186 miles. The Zoe is the best-selling electric vehicle in Europe and provides a real alternative to internal combustion-engine cars, since average daily commuting distances are well within the Zoe’s capabilities.
The new battery removes the final psychological barrier that stands in the way of buying an electric car, so-called ‘range anxiety’, since Zoe users can now travel further and enjoy a wider variety of driving situations without worrying about charging.
The Zoe’s new Z.E. 40 battery boasts 41kWh of useful energy, equivalent to almost double the storage capacity of the Zoe’s standard battery (22kWh of useful energy). Renault and LG engineers have succeeded in increasing storage capacity without making the battery any bigger or a lot heavier. It was optimised by working on the chemistry of the cells in order to increase their energy density, rather than stacking additional battery modules, a commonly used technique. This major new technology has been developed while ensuring the battery’s reliability and safety.