Luxury Goes Green: Audi and Porsche Are Moving Forward with Eco Car Design

Have you ever dreamed of owning an eco car? What about a luxury one? Tesla’s electric cars garner a lot of love from the press, but there’s nothing quite like sliding behind the wheel of a sleek Porsche or an elegant Audi.

We’ve got some great news for you. It looks like the dreams of a luxurious eco car are coming true. Porsche and Audi are both jumping on the electric car bandwagon.

In the near future, we can expect to see the release of eco car models from both companies. Go ahead and take a moment to do your happy dance, we’ll wait …

As you would expect, Porsche and Audi have some exciting stuff planned for their models.

What kind of stuff? We’re so glad you asked. Let’s take a look at the eco friendly models both companies have in the works. Plus, we’ll speculate about some new technologies that they appear to be adding to the mix.

Porsche Mission E Eco Car

The Mission E design is a sleek, sexy beast of an eco car. Of course, we wouldn’t expect anything less from Porsche, now would we?

The look stays true to what you would expect from a Porsche performance sedan. It’s got the bulging fenders and the hood slopes downward the way you would expect.

The design carries traces of both the 911 and the 918 Spyder designs already offered by Porsche.

Of course, the final product will more than likely end up a little different than the concept car. We’ll have to wait and see.

However the design ends up, it is sure to be downright amazing.

Performance

The Mission E performance goals are rather impressive. After all, eco car or not we are talking about the worlds most iconic sports car manufacturer. Leave it to Porsche to come up with an eco car amazing enough to rival, well, other Porsche vehicles.

The vision includes an eye-popping 600 horsepower motor that can power the sedan from 0-62MPH in less than 3.5 seconds. That sounds a touch more exciting than the sensible Toyota Prius, now doesn’t it?

Charging Capabilities

The charging capabilities are nothing to sneeze at either. Porsche claims that the Mission E will go 310 miles on one charge. That goes a long way towards reducing range anxiety.

Even more remarkable, the battery only needs 15 minutes to charge to 80%.

The kicker is that the charger is 800 volts. To put that into perspective, the Tesla Model S has a 400-volt charger.

At this point, your local charging station won’t offer that kind of voltage. But remember, we’re talking about the wave of the future here.

Porsche is already working with other car companies to build faster-charging stations. They’re focused on projects in Europe right now, but the Americas are likely to follow soon. Also, Tesla knows it has to keep up to stay in the game. The company has already promised faster chargers for its newer models. We can assume that means faster-charging stations will start to pop up in America too.

One more point is the vehicle’s inductive charging ability. The Mission E will be capable of what is in essence wireless charging for electric cars. Of course, it will have the conventional cables as well.

Inside the Mission E

The cockpit of the Mission E is quite futuristic in both appearance and function. Porsche has loaded this baby with impressive luxury features. Again, we wouldn’t expect anything less.

Designers have conveniently positioned 5 virtual gauges in the driver’s line of sight.

And get this, the dashboard is holographic. The system uses cameras to track the driver’s eye movement. It will know what instrument the driver is looking at. Plus, the system can track where the driver is sitting. It will then position the displays for the driver to see them with ease. The driver can even scroll through menus without having to touch anything.

You may notice that the sleek exterior design of this next-generation eco car doesn’t include mirrors. That’s because the designers replaced them with cameras.

The display shows up right in the bottom corners of the windshield. Now you won’t have to take your eyes off the road in front of you to see all the way around you.

Future Goals

Porsche is hoping to have 50% of its production be electric cars by 2023. That goal seems likely to happen.

There are rumors of both a crossover coupe and SUV in the works. We expect to see those after the Mission E releases.

The crossover SUV they plan to make electric is the very popular Macan model. It is currently Porsche’s best selling vehicle. They sold almost 100,000 of them in 2016.

This one vehicle alone would carry them a long way toward their 50% electric car goal. If the sales numbers stay up after going electric, that is.

We’re excited to see whatever Porsche comes up with over the next few years. Their incredible track record tells us they won’t disappoint.

Audi e-tron quattro Eco SUV

Audi is working on another exciting new eco car that may hit the streets a little sooner than the Mission E. Let’s take a look at Audi’s e-tron quattro, an electric SUV. It will be interesting to see how the Tesla Model X fares in competition with Audi.

While the e-tron may be a bit less sexy than the Mission E, it is far from mundane.

Check out the sleek lines on this SUV. The drag coefficient measures in at a low .25. To put that in perspective, the drag coefficient for Tesla’s Model S is .24. A big help to reaching this number is the elimination of the side-view mirrors as Porsche does on the Mission E.

Charging Capabilities

Audi’s e-tron quattro eco car will have a driving range of 310 miles. This is the same as the Mission E, but it has a bit less power. For normal driving the engine puts out 420hp. There is a special boost mode that can up that to 500hp when you need it.

The e-tron quattro offers the same inductive (wireless) and conventional charging as the Mission E, but it has an extra special feature. Let’s talk about that next.

Solar Energy

Using solar energy in an eco car isn’t a brand new idea. Car manufacturers have played around with the concept for a while.

In fact, the Toyota Prius employs a bit of solar energy. Audi is building off of that and puts solar panels on the roof of this SUV model.

The solar panels won’t charge the battery, but they will run other systems. The idea is to power the air-conditioning unit and entertainment systems. That way the primary battery won’t have to power everything.

Using solar energy for these systems will increase the driving range of the vehicle.

The effectiveness, of course, depends a lot on where the car is in the world. The sun is not always out everywhere. Plus, solar radiation is stronger the nearer you get to the equator.

To learn more about its effectiveness, we will need to see wider spread use of the technology. But the implications solar energy can have for cars in the future is very exciting.

In the future, Audi plans to integrate solar cells into the panoramic glass roofs on all their electric vehicles. That sounds like a beautiful idea.

Inside the e-tron quattro

The interior may not be quite as souped-up as the Mission E, but it’s not too far behind. Audi already has a pretty advanced dashboard set up in their current cars and the e-tron quattro’s is even more advanced.

We already mentioned that the e-tron doesn’t have mirrors. It has the same cameras so you can see behind you, but with displays built into the door panels.

While not as futuristic as the Mission E, The rest of the e-tron quattro’s interior is pretty impressive. Instead of analog instruments, Audi employs a configurable display that can be customized to your favorite settings.

The car is also teetering on the cusp of autonomous driving. It is decked out with cameras, a laser scanner, radars, and ultrasonic sensors.

Don’t get too excited yet, though. The first iteration isn’t going to be a completely self-driving vehicle. But it will be the next step toward completely autonomous vehicles in the not too distant future.

A Brave New World

We are incredibly excited that luxury car manufacturers are starting to build eco cars. Tesla has had incredible success, but it is still a startup and somewhat of a new company.

Audi and Porsche are both well-established manufacturers. They have lots of experience beating out their competition. It will be interesting to see how the competition between the two plays out.

For more exciting news on a car you can actually drive off the lot right now, check out our article on the incredible redesign of Audi’s Q5 model.

If you have already got an Audi or Porsche in the garage, check out our service information and advice. We have tons of great info for the best way to keep your baby humming along until one of these eco cars finds its way onto your driveway.