Lucid
Lucid has simply revealed the small print of its model-year 2025 updates, and among the many tweaks to its good-looking electrical sedan is a formidable bump in vary effectivity. The entry-level Lucid Air Pure, which begins at $69,900, can now journey 420 miles on a single cost of its 84 kWh battery. That equates to five miles/kWh (12.4 kWh/100 km), making the Air Pure essentially the most environment friendly electrical automobile on the market as we speak.
The vary bump is generally due to Lucid making a warmth pump commonplace throughout the vary, after first including one to the ultra-powerful, ultra-expensive Air Sapphire.
Lucid has additionally upgraded the pc {hardware} that oversees the Air’s numerous subsystems. The automaker says it has tripled processing energy and doubled the system’s reminiscence, which ought to translate to quicker and higher infotainment. And Lucid has made its superior driver help system commonplace throughout the lineup, too.
Whereas the Air Pure is perhaps the primary manufacturing EV being offered to achieve 5 miles/kWh, it is not the longest-range Lucid Air on the market. That is still the $110,900 Grand Touring, which may go 512 miles (824 km) on a single cost. The 2025 Lucid Air Touring, which slots between them, has a variety of 406 miles (654 km) and begins at $78,900.
Whereas nonetheless a relative minnow in comparison with Rivian, Lucid has been on one thing of an upward trajectory of late. Worth cuts have undoubtedly helped it have a file Q2, delivering 2,394 vehicles for its finest three months to date.
Who did this math?
Along with claiming 5 miles/kWh for the Air Pure, Lucid additionally notes in its press launch that it has achieved “a file 146 MPGe score” for the automotive.
Lucid’s model-year 2025 knowledge is not within the EPA’s on-line gasoline financial system database but, so Ars cannot examine the marginally extra detailed info there (which ought to get away the MPGe determine into metropolis, freeway, and mixed figures), however 146 MPGe is just equal to 4.3 miles/kWh; 5 miles/kWh is 169 MPGe.
We requested Lucid in regards to the distinction, and the corporate advised Ars that with EVs, losses within the charging course of from resistance within the cables and from heating the battery make a distinction.
“The explanation we don’t love MPGe is that batteries are the true expense for EVs—not electrical energy. If you happen to could be extra vitality environment friendly when really driving, you’ll be able to cut back the capability of the battery pack within the automobiles you construct—lowering price, lowering weight, and lowering the pure assets you want per automobile. Alternatively, it’s good to reduce vitality misplaced throughout charging, however in case you get solely 2.5 mi/kWh on the street, you continue to are caught with the large costly battery pack,” Lucid advised Ars.
(This doesn’t change the truth that MPGe is derived by multiplying miles/kWh by 33.7, the quantity of vitality in a gallon of gasoline.)
Regardless of the incongruent math, the 2025 Air Pure nonetheless beats the 2024 mannequin, which makes do with a mixed 140 MPGe and 410 miles of vary, in response to the EPA.
