Volkswagen Unveils Its First Production Electric Car

Martin Winterkorn, Volkswagen's CEO, unveils the e-up!

We missed it in Geneva last week, but the first production electric car from Volkswagen was unveiled at VW's headquarters in Wolfsburg this morning. We've seen several Golf prototypes, but the first production EV from Volkswagen is based on the up! and it's logically called the e-up!

We bet the electric Golf will be named the e-Golf and compared to it, the up! is actually two models down. In other words, it's the Yaris-sized Polo that's below the Golf, and the up! is below the Polo with dimensions close to the diminutive Chevrolet Spark. But the two cars are very different. When the Spark has an angry look and cheap plastics inside, the up! looks nice and refined, outside and inside.

The Volkswagen's e-up!

The e-up!—likely to only be available with four doors—is a small electric four seater city car. This format works well for the European market. With limited range and performance, Volkswagen clearly says that its e-up! is "for daily use in the city," and that "is also ideal for commuters," or is "an innovative second car."

This is clearly not a competitor to the Tesla Model S, but it may be what millions have been waiting for: an electric car for the people, with a moderate price. The battery is perfectly integrated below the floor, and it stores 18.7 kWh. Engineers will understand that the range is limited, and Volkswagen announces 93 miles on standard European test methods. You can deduct 20 percent of that number in real world driving conditions, but it's still more than enough most people, and Volkswagen will be happy to provide a diesel Passat with a 700-plus miles of range to those who need more.

The Volkswagen's e-up!

The car's weight is reasonable at 2,612 pounds, but power is modest. Its motor provide 40 kW continuous with a 60 kW peak (82 hp). That's more than the base up! which only has 60 horsepower but many are waiting for the GTI version which should get 110 hp. Torque is equally modest at 155 lb-ft and that means this e-up will be much slower than the Chevrolet Spark EV. Volkswagen says it: going 0 to 62 mph will take 14 seconds, and top speed is not autobahn-rated at 84 mph.

But the e-up! and the Spark EV will have a common feature however: their will both use the Combined Charging System (CCS) which supports both AC and DC charging. The only difference will be that the Chevrolet will get the American CCS whereas the Volkswagen will get the European CCS. That's with the Type 2 Mennekes connector on top, and not the SAE the Chevrolet gets. The plugs supports both AC and DC charging, and Volkswagen says the car can be recharged to 80 percent in 30 minutes. Again, the Chevrolet is faster. The one point where Volkswagen might make a difference is the price, but there's no indication about it yet. My estimate is that the e-up will sell for two-thirds the price of a Nissan LEAF in Germany—and possibly less.

Volkswagen announced recently that it had opened a new facility to assemble the packs for the e-up! in Braunschweig, with a capacity of 11,000 packs a year. There's no word yet about the supplier for the the battery cells.

The Volkswagen e-up will have its show premiere in Frankfurt this September, and Germans will be able to buy it soon after. Other European countries will follow, but the e-up is not be expected to be sold where the gasoline model isn't available. Americans will have to wait for the e-Golf.