Around the world, there are some 20 motor shows, most of them branded “international”. But three of them, Geneva, Frankfurt and Tokyo have tended to dominate in recent years each for a rather different reason. The emphasis in Geneva tends to be about style, opulence and extravagance. Frankfurt meanwhile is much more “nuts and bolts”, an engineering fest every bit as much as it is a marketing opportunity for the new Mercedes, Volkswagens, BMWs, Porsches and Audis. And Tokyo is different again, in that it has become the major home of concept cars - not simply sleek futuristic and sometimes quite whacky designs but no less importantly the home of concept engineering.
When all is said and done, a vehicle is a box with a wheel at each corner. Automotive technology is always finding new refinements to safety, engines, gears and suspension. Each of these developments is popularly supposed to be made by manufacturers of one brand seeking to steal a marketing march on their rivals. But the reality is that many breakthrough technologies are generally licensed to the rest of the industry. Moreover, the integration of the global car industry means that completely different brands can actually share quite a lot of parts, not least in powertrains - the engines, transmission, drive shafts, differentials and final drive to the wheels.
This week in Tokyo, manufacturers have been concentrating on their electric vehicles, not confined to automobiles - Mercedes was showing off its new electric truck. The current electric revolution is actually Back to the Future. At the turn of the last century, there were more electric (and steam-powered) vehicles in the United States than there were gasoline automobiles. Easier to maintain, with no gears and no vibration, the electric vehicle could have stayed out front if it had not been for the limited range due to the then state of battery technology. The last decade has seen major advances in the capacity and weight of battery storage with more breakthroughs expected. But for the moment the gas engine remains the cheapest and most efficient option and this week Mazda showed off its SkyActiv X technology. This is claimed to improve engine efficiency by up to 30 percent, thus sharply reducing fuel consumption. Interestingly, Nissan is the only other automotive company known to be looking at this technology.
There is a clear danger here. With the big money going into electric, the willingness to make radical improvements to traditional combustion engines such as that being promised by Mazda will be diminished. Valuable new technology could be marginalized. The rush to electric is requiring major infrastructural re-engineering. The introduction of electric-only vehicles is now being mandated by legislators. Automakers are rushing to meet deadlines. It remains to be seen if their products will be sufficiently cheap and efficient.
And there is another major factor to which environmentally-aware politicians are only just now waking up, which is the availability of electric power to meet the surging demand from the new electric vehicles. First adopters are currently having no problems. But in countries such as the UK, which have under-invested in new power generation, a surge in electric vehicles could produce major outages. And it remains a moot question if the generation of much of this power by conventional means will not negate the “environmental dividend” expected by electric vehicle owners.
