Sono Motors to release solar charging Electric Vehicle

The German car company, Sono Motors, revealed their solar-powered electric car, the Sono Sion on Monday, July 25, 2022. The company unveiled Sion at a community event called “Celebrate the Sun”, held in Munch, Germany.

Sono Motors started in 2016, and the solar-powered vehicle is their first product, and is slated to hit the market by the second half of 2023, but only in Germany, Austria and Switzerland initially.

The Sono Sion is a compact family car that is similar to most electric cars in build and function, except it has an outer shell made of 456 solar cells that constantly charge the car in sunny conditions. The car would come with a 54-kilowatt hour Lithium based battery, giving it a range of about 300 kilometers.

Sion will still require traditional EV battery charging, but according to the company, the consistent charging of solar power, albeit slow, would be sufficient for most urban commutes. Sono estimates that solar charging could extend the vehicle’s range by 90-100km on average. The car is also built with bidirectional charging, which means that any excess stored power can be redirected to other devices or even homes.

According to Sono, the Sion has been booked by as many as 19,000 people, six thousand more than the number of people who had booked it in November. The company expects to be able to manufacture as many as 43,000 Sions per year.

However, they still face financial and logistic challenges of being in the electric vehicle market, with their stock price falling since becoming a public entity and being forced to change manufacturers.

Sono’s Other Ventures

During the Consumer Electronics Show, 2021, Sono also unveiled a solar bus kit, which is intended to be used with any European bus, and standardized as such. According to the company, the solar kits can potentially save thousands of liters of diesel and reduce emissions.

While they cannot change the main power source of the engine from diesel to electricity, the kits can power the subsystems of a bus, such as ventilation and air conditioning, requiring less power from the bus’ fuel-powered batteries.