At Mercedes, The Fuel Cell Gets A Plug

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At Mercedes, The Fuel Cell Gets A Plug
At Mercedes, The Fuel Cell Gets A Plug

Video: At Mercedes, The Fuel Cell Gets A Plug

Video: At Mercedes, The Fuel Cell Gets A Plug
Video: EQ Power Plug-In Hybrid - The 3d generation of plug-in hybrids from Mercedes-Benz 2024, March
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Has Daimler slept through electric mobility? Of course not, the Swabians are convinced and refer not only to the offensive with the plug-in hybrids, but also to the further electrification of the drive train and the upcoming GLC with fuel cell.

By Frank Mertens

In football, a game usually lasts 90 minutes - unless there is extra time. But while the European football championship was opened punctually on Friday evening between hosts France and Romania (2: 1) by referee Viktor Kassai, nobody in the car industry really knows when the "game for the Champions League of e-mobility" will kick off. takes place, as Jürgen Schenk said this Friday at the "TecDay Road to the Future" in Stuttgart. Above all, nobody knows how long this game will last, added Schenk, who is responsible for integrating the electrical systems at Daimler.

Schenk points out that in Germany the number of vehicles with electric and hybrid drives has increased more than tenfold in the past decade. "Overall, not even one in 300 vehicles with electrified drive was on the road." In other words: "99 percent of customers have not yet decided on an electric car," said Schenk. So you are still in a training camp, so to speak.

Waiting for the start of the preliminary round

But maybe this is where the basic problem of the German carmaker lies - and not just that of Daimler. One waits until the costs of the batteries fall, the range increases, the charging infrastructure enables entry into electromobility instead of getting started as the US competitor Tesla is showing with its models. While Tesla is practically about to make it into the round of 16, Daimler and Co. are still waiting for the start of the preliminary round.

No wonder that not a few think that the German manufacturers slept through the kick-off. Something like this was recently rejected by Daimler boss Dieter Zetsche ("We haven't slept through anything with electromobility"). Of course, Schenk does not see it any differently than his boss - and referred to the efforts that Daimler has already made and will continue to do in the future. In the next two years alone, Daimler will invest 14.5 billion euros in research and development, more than half of which will be for green technologies. These are considerable sums of money that Daimler is paying in advance in order to ultimately be at the forefront of the mobility of the future.

Bet on the future

It is a bet in the future because nobody knows exactly when the market will start to run up. And the fact that Daimler has not done anything so far cannot be held against the Swabians. You have already launched eight models with plug-in hybrids, and two more will follow by 2017. There is also the electric B-Class and, from the end, the new electric Smart, if you leave out the commercial vehicle division.

In addition, the range of the plug-in hybrids is gradually being increased. While the current S-Class has a purely electric range of 30 kilometers, the model revision will have over 50 kilometers in a year. In perspective, the range will increase further with the technological leaps in lithium-ion batteries. The range will increase by around 30 percent by 2020 and with the introduction of post-lithium-ion technology, it will even be possible to double it by 2025, said Schenk.

And the electrification of the drive is progressing increasingly. At the end of 2017, the GLC Coupé, the first fuel cell vehicle with a range of 500 kilometers, will be launched on the market, and in this decade a larger, all-electric vehicle with a range of up to 500 kilometers. The GLC is the first series production car with the new fuel cell technology - and it is not only powered by a fuel cell, but also has a plug-in hybrid. "This gives the fuel cell a plug," as Schenk said.

More range through combination with plug-in

Mercedes GLC F-Cell
Mercedes GLC F-Cell

Although this combination could be dispensed with, it certainly offers advantages such as supplying the start-stop system with electricity and the option of recuperation, as Christian Mohrdieck, who is responsible for fuel cells at Daimler, emphasizes. That is one aspect. But the other and more important aspect is the additional range of 50 kilometers that the plug-in hybrid offers the customer. While the fuel cell is located under the bonnet, the nine kWh battery is located in the rear. The two water tanks are located under the vehicle in the Mtteltunnel and behind the rear. Together they have a capacity of four kilograms. Refueling takes just three minutes.

With the increasing expansion of the infrastructure with hydrogen filling stations, the battery in future fuel cell vehicles from the Stuttgart-based company will also become smaller. Because with the expansion of the filling station network for hydrogen cars, the fear of insufficient range will continue to decrease.

Who remembers: After the world tour with the Mercedes B-Class Fuel Cell, Daimler had actually announced in mid-2011 that the fuel cell would be launched in 2014. But the infrastructure at that time had not developed as expected. Accordingly, Daimler had postponed the market launch to 2017. Even then, Daimler's technology was considered the most mature in the industry. But while they waited in Stuttgart, the Asians were once again faster: Toyota launched the Mirai in January 2015, in Germany it has been available since September last year. And Hyundai has also been at the start with the Hyundia ix 35 Fuel Cell since last year. Starting this summer, 50 of these vehicles will be used in Linde's “Bee Zero” car sharing offer in Munich.

So there are manufacturers who have already left the training camp and started the game. Daimler, however, is still waiting for the kick-off. The Swabians, however, see it sportily and confidently point out that the B-Class F-Cell and the Citaro F-Cell-Hybrid city bus have covered eight million kilometers together. There is no question that the system works. So it will be interesting to see who will ultimately prevail with a view to the mobility of the future. The early starters or the late starters? For those responsible in Stuttgart, of course, that's just a rhetorical question.

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