Do you feel lucky? Why current range estimation methods are holding back EV adoption

One challenge facing the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) is the reduction of the impact of running out of fuel. An EV, with its limited charging point infrastructure and long charge times, is not seen as being as reliable as a conventional car in this respect. To make EVs more acceptable, forward-looking predictive methods of calculating range need to be developed which also take into account opportunities to conserve or harvest energy, as well as environmental factors such as terrain and weather conditions. Using a well-established EV range simulator, this paper describes scenarios showing the limitations of relying on such an approach and the potential detrimental results to both the driver and vehicle´s ability to start and complete a journey. It provides an overview of the research being undertaken by the authors to address these problems, including a description of `Electrikitty´, a road legal pure EV that will be used to gather data to verify the development of novel range estimation algorithms.