VW’s electric car battery packs take to the water

The new-generation Silent-Yachts solar-powered catamaran is a future model concept designed by Barcelona-based Cupra, the performance arm of Volkswagen’s more affordable Spanish car brand, Seat.

As well as supplying the framework for the new generation of Silent-Yachts models, Volkswagen has also collaborated with the project by stumping up the batteries developed for its road-going MEB electric vehicle platform.

Volkswagen’s MEB – also known as the modular electric drive – platform was developed to power a new generation of electric VWs, with five new models, including the ID.4 and ID.4 Crozz, due in 2021, and initially in China.

Other markets, including Australia, will one day launch with the ID.3, a VW Golf-sized hatchback.

VW hopes to ramp up its production of the electric drive systems to at least 600,000 a year by 2025.

The new Silent-Yachts model adapts VW’s battery pack made specifically for driving an electric motor. The battery pack’s modular design means VW can adapt it to suit different applications, such as more range or higher performance.

The Cupra render shows the electric motors mounted low in the hulls, providing a very shallow shaft angle compared with a conventionally powered catamaran.

The batteries also spread their weight evenly across the hulls, creating a low centre of gravity along the hull’s centreline.

It’s likely to be an expensive exercise for Silent-Yachts, though, as the batteries usually account for around 40 percent of an electric car’s cost – and potentially more for a boat using the equivalent of four cars’ worth of modules.

Silent-Yachts has worked towards its goal of producing a range of emissions-free, solar powered cruisers, but with a focus on high-end luxury, since 2005.

In 2018, its then-flagship Silent 64 catamaran became the first solar-fuelled production vessel to cross the Atlantic Ocean under its own power.

Its biggest venture to date is the Silent-Yachts Silent 80, a three-level, 24.3-metre long and 12 metre wide, 65-tonne floating luxury apartment that uses its vast roof space to house solar panels that feed its batteries. However, it also uses diesel engines as a back-up.

The price? Around the equivalent of $9 million.

It’s not the first time a car-maker has crossed the divide to the marine world. BMW’s battery packs for its i3 electric car are adapted and used to power electron-fuelled outboard engines for German-based group Torqueedo.