BMW’S NEUE KLASSE EV WILL USE HYDROGEN

A few weeks ago, BMW chairman Oliver Zipse said that to reach the automaker’s goal of electrifying half its global sales, it will have to build fuel cell powered vehicles as well. That also means choosing hydrogen!

To do so, the upcoming new Neue Klasse platform its engineers are working on for 2025 will have to be flexible enough to be all-electric or fuel cell powered. It should include a sedan and an SUV about the size of the current 3-Series (and X3), making the vehicles potential rivals for the Tesla Model 3 and Model Y. Yet, BMW will have to adapt the new platform as hydrogen needs cylindrical tanks that take up more space than batteries.

Will this project ever make it to production and sales in North America is unknown for now. Meanwhile, BMW is working on its iX5 that combines a Toyota fuel-cell stack with its fifth-generation electric-drive technology but most probably only for Europe.