The EPA lists the Porsche Taycan Turbo as one of the most inefficient electric cars sold in the United States. That may not really matter to potential Porsche Taycan customers, who will mainly be Porsche enthusiasts with more than one vehicle. While brand loyalty may be enough to woo those buyers to an inefficient vehicle, the rest of us are left wondering how Porsche dropped the ball on the range.
Jason Fenske over at Engineering Explained is here to break things down for us, as always. After giving us some context as to the Taycan’s place within the EV spectrum, he starts looking into why, exactly, this particular Porsche is so inefficient.
To put things into perspective, the Taycan Turbo is rated at an equivalent of 69 mpg, which is… not great. At all. It’s pretty shoddy when compared to models like the Audi e-tron (rated at 74 mpg) or the Tesla Model S Long Range (111 mpg).
The problems start almost immediately. For instance, the Taycan is almost one thousand pounds heavier than its competition—and more than some pickup trucks. That serves as a massive battery drain! All that extra weight is a huge problem when it comes to efficiency. If the Taycan even wanted to think about competing with the Tesla SLR in terms of range, it would need to add yet another thousand pounds of battery weight. It’s hard to increase range just using more battery; you need to find ways to actually use that battery power in the most effective possible way.
At the same time, though, there are different battery strategies between Porsche and other automakers, along with how it approaches battery regeneration via braking. If you want the details, you’ll have to check out the video—but there are a constellation of choices Porsche made with its Taycan Turbo led to a less efficient vehicle
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