Porsche doesn’t believe electrification is the only way to make vehicles carbon neutral
E fuels can be created from water and electricity
Older vehicles don’t need to be retrofitted to use e fuels
As the entire automotive industry is moving towards electrification, some companies are more reluctant to put all of their eggs in the same basket.
This is the case of Porsche, which believes e-fuels will become a viable solution that will allow combustion engines to be just as clean as electric vehicles.
Porsche is currently working on the development of its own e-fuel, which it says is carbon neutral and causes very little tailpipe emissions. The company also says this e-fuel could be sold for under $2 a litre, which is on par with current average fossil fuel prices in Canada.
This combustible is created by using renewable energy to separate water into hydrogen and oxygen, the first of which is then processed with CO2 to become e-methane, which can be burned by a regular combustion engine, without modifications.
This last part is what makes this avenue promising since it offers an eco-friendly solution to keep much of the current fleet of vehicles on the road instead of junking many good cars in favour of a new EV.
This is also good news for owners of classic cars, who will be able to drive their older and less efficient vehicles without generating much pollution.
It is also encouraging to enthusiasts who want to keep driving combustion-powered vehicles and it could actually save the manual transmission, which is almost assured to be a thing of the past if every vehicle becomes electric.
Porsche has also said many times that it doesn’t plan to make the 911 an EV despite almost all of its competitors moving in this direction. The introduction of e-fuels could thus allow the brand to keep its word while still making the 911 much cleaner than current versions.
This doesn’t mean the brand is against electric vehicles however since it is already making the Taycan and it is about to launch the Macan EV. The company even said that it expects over 80% of its sales to be EVs by 2030, meaning that e-fuels would only be used for special models, like the 911.
