Volvo will use electronic superchargers. Is it taking a shortcut to stop selling pure fuel vehicles from 2019?

On May 16, Henrik Green, senior vice president of research and development at Volvo Car Group, said at the Vienna Automotive Seminar that Volvo will abandon the mechanical supercharging technology currently used on the T6 and T8 engines, and will instead adopt a turbocharger + electronic supercharger approach on future engines.

The T6 and T8 engines were released in 2013. Based on the four-cylinder engine, they use a "twin-charge" method of turbocharging + supercharging, which is a high-end combination of Volvo's VEA engine family. The maximum power of the T6 is 236kW, while the maximum power of the T8 hybrid version is as high as 294kW.

For engines with lower power, Volvo only offers turbocharging. For example, the maximum power of the T5 engine is 186kW.

This trend of electrification of superchargers was first applied by Audi.

The Audi SQ7 TDI launched in 2016 has an electronic supercharger installed on the V8 diesel engine, with a maximum power of 324kW. This model and the SQ8 TDI will return to the market soon. The Audi S4, S5, S6 and S7 models in the European market will also be equipped with a V6 TDI engine and an electronic supercharger.

Unlike Audi's route, Volvo has long announced that it will abandon diesel vehicles, so its evolutionary path is to install electronic superchargers on gasoline engines.

This technology is not new, and several major suppliers around the world are using it. Among them, the first to promote electronic superchargers was the French parts supplier - Valeo.

The electronic supercharger developed by Valeo works independently of the air loop, integrates switched reluctance technology and is driven by an electric motor with an instant response speed of 300 milliseconds. It can provide the required torque according to different working conditions and provide faster thrust before the turbine intervenes, which can effectively reduce turbo lag. At the same time, the manufacturer claims that this technology can also reduce fuel consumption by 10%.

At the same time, the power of the electronic supercharger is low and can generally work with a common 12V battery. But if you want to play a greater role, you have to use a 48V battery.

Green did not disclose which supplier Volvo will use for the electric supercharger, nor did he disclose the maximum output power of the new supercharger.

Foreign media speculate that Volvo's new energy path is as follows: except for plug-in hybrid and pure electric models, this electronic supercharger will be used in all traditional fuel vehicles.

Summary of the car gathering

In 2017, Volvo announced that it would stop producing and selling pure internal combustion engine models from 2019, and all new cars on the market would be equipped with electric motors. This made it the first traditional car company in the world to stop producing pure fuel vehicles.

Now that 2019 is almost halfway over, how is things going?

From January to April, Volvo's terminal sales in China were 43,900 vehicles, of which 580 were plug-in models and 0 were pure electric models. Therefore, the proportion of new energy vehicles was only 1.3%. Not only did it fail to achieve its declared goal of stopping the sale of pure fuel vehicles, but its proportion of new energy vehicles was also far below the average level of the Chinese market. So, will the electronic supercharger be its savior to fulfill its promise?

"Strictly speaking, if there is no 48V mild hybrid technology and only an electronic supercharger is added, it is difficult to call it a new energy vehicle." A consultant in the automotive industry said directly to Cheju.com.

What's more, it will take some time for this electronic supercharger to become popular. I wonder how Volvo will fulfill its promise?