"Shared Fuel" Architecture: Helping Increase EV Variety

Over ten years ago, dedicated EV vehicle architecture was just emerging. The Tesla Model S and Nissan Leaf represented a significant shift in EV design, as they were the first mass market dedicated EVs. Previously, EVs were built using retrofitted/revised already existing vehicle designs and platforms. This meant that vehicles like the Ford Focus EV, a competitor to the Leaf at the time, were not designed from the ground up to be an EV. This was very apparent in vehicles like the Focus, as strangely placed components made the vehicle appear compromised. This was also the case with PHEVs of the time as well. This caused many would-be early adopters to give pause to adopting.

While plenty of automakers have now developed and sold vehicles created on dedicated EV platforms, VW’s modular electric drive matrix (MEB) being one example, something familiar is making a comeback: what I like to call “shared fuel architectures.” Essentially, this is a huge refinement of retrofitting attempts that created early EVs, but with huge advances in technology, designs, and packaging, automakers have returned to the idea to speed up development of new EVs. One such example is the BMW i4, which uses BMW’s Cluster Architecture, allowing them to create an “all new” vehicle that borrows heavily from an existing one, without needing a dedicated platform. The Hyundai Motor Company has a dedicated EV platform, called E-GMP, which underpins big sellers like the Kia EV6, Hyundai Ioniq 5, and the Genesis GV60. What’s interesting is that HMC also created electric versions of their G80 sedan and GV70 crossover, which are not built on the E-GMP platform. While most of the non powertrain components are essentially shared between the gas and electric versions of both vehicles, the powertrains seem to be borrowed from E-GMP, as the batteries for both match E-GMP storage capacity.

Compared to the attempts of ten years ago, it is much harder to tell that these new vehicles are not dedicated EVs. Since most automakers are planning to end ICE sales in the coming decades, this development approach helps ease the transition for buyers. Many in the public are still turned off by EVs because of the differentiating styling automakers attempt, so by having identical designs to the ICE powered variants, this no longer becomes an issue. There are some other benefits to this approach as well, including improving the desirability of EVs to more people. By having an ICE powered GV70 right next to an electric GV70, comparisons can be made on the spot and the benefits of going electric are therefore more apparent. By increasing the variety of EVs available, automakers using this approach can attract more customers and boost adoption.