Volkswagen I.D. EV Concept: A Long-Range EV That's a Ways Away

There is little question that Volkswagen hopes its fresh slogan, Think New, and a gaggle of electric vehicles scheduled to go on sale between 2020 and 2025 will help customers, the media, and those proverbial baby seals clinging to ever-shrinking ice floes to move on from the automaker’s diesel-emissions scandal. The company basically said as much at the reveal for the I.D. concept, which previews the first of these new-think EVs. VW Group CEO Matthias Müller stated that Wolfsburg is moving forward “despite the things we currently need to cope with” and declared that the brand’s future “will be powered by electricity.” Given that those “things” that need coping with include criminal charges for those involved, huge fines, and yet-to-be-finalized costs associated with fixing or buying back customer cars, it’s little wonder the CEO tried striking an optimistic tone, adding that, “The question is not whether Volkswagen is going to make it, but how it will make it.”

The Electric Way

It might be too grandiose to declare the I.D. concept—and the production model it’s promised to spawn within the next four years—the “how” in Volkswagen’s long march out of its current quagmire. Nevertheless, the happy-looking EV appears well equipped to take on Tesla’s upcoming Model 3 and Chevrolet’s Bolt. Volkswagen promises the price will be “attractive” and that the boxy EV will be capable of about 250 to 375 miles of driving between recharges, according to the favorable European EV cycle. (Assume somewhat diminished ratings once the EPA releases numbers in the United States.) Should the eventual production I.D.’s price fall in the same pre-rebate $40K space as the Bolt and the Model 3, the car stands a decent shot at helping Volkswagen along in its goal to sell 1 million EVs across multiple brands annually by 2025.

In an effort to whip up excitement for the I.D., Volkswagen is tossing out some heady comparisons between the EV and iconic models from its history, pegging it as being “as revolutionary as the Beetle was seven decades ago and the first Golf was 40 years ago.” Volkswagen also reminded us that those are two of the best-selling nameplates of all time. We wouldn’t describe the I.D.’s look as iconic, but then the Beetle started out as a decade-past-its-prime lump before slowly achieving iconic status and surviving for more than 50 years.

Like the Chevrolet Bolt, the I.D. is a tallish hatchback—not quite a crossover, but certainly not as low slung as, say, the Volkswagen Golf. The I.D.’s most novel design features are eyelike LED headlight surrounds that darken to near invisibility when the car is off—and then “awaken,” wide-eyed, when the car is turned on. The cluster of LEDs in their centers can selectively light up to “look around” like eyeballs, even locking onto and following the driver as he or she approaches. There’s no way around this, so we’ll just say it: The eye things are creepy. Other lighting features include blue-backlit lower-body accents that pulsate when the I.D. is charging and white-lit door handles that can do a little jig when the vehicle is started. Interesting, but the overall design strikes us more as generically futuristic than as the Next Big Thing.

Volkswagen’s Modular Electric Drive (MEB) platform sits beneath the I.D.’s body, which is designed from the outset as a battery-electric skateboard chassis. This dedicated EV platform allows the wheels to be pushed to the corners, leaving pleasantly short overhangs front and rear, and its rear-mounted electric motor affords greater room for the front wheels to turn more sharply than with a front-mounted powertrain. As a result, the I.D. has a turning circle of just 32.5 feet. The tiny Smart Fortwo still has it beat with its 22.8-foot turning radius, but the Volkswagen is more than four and a half feet longer and rides on a 108.3-inch wheelbase (that’s 4.5 inches longer than the Golf’s). Other performance metrics include a claimed sub-8.0-second zero-to-60-mph time and a top speed of 99 mph. Volkswagen indicates that battery size and motor performance could be cranked up or down for better acceleration or additional range. No matter the battery pack’s size, it will consist of lithium-ion cells and be mounted in the floor. Charging can be handled via a typical plug connector or, in the future, by means of an inductive charging pad theoretically capable of supplying an 80 percent charge in 30 minutes.

The skateboard platform’s other big benefit is that it frees up interior room—so much so that Volkswagen calls the I.D.’s cabin design an Open Space concept. The front seats can swivel around to face the rears, and the floor is completely flat. The doors, for their part, follow an open-wide ethos, with the rear doors hinging backward while the fronts yawn open to nearly 90 degrees. Each door also houses a touchscreen control unit (one per passenger) with the same functionality found on today’s centralized, dashboard-mounted infotainment units, leaving the driver only a 10-inch digital gauge cluster and an augmented-reality-capable head-up display (think navigation instructions laid out “over” the road ahead of the car, from the driver’s perspective). The simple cabin is encircled by a single twisting Möbius strip for a cosseting feel despite its minimalist look.

Don’t Forget: It’s Autonomous!

Initially, when the I.D. goes into production in 2020, it will be a standard EV. However, by 2025, Volkswagen intends to sell a version with an I.D. Pilot autonomous-driving mode. As a concept car, the I.D. has the Pilot tech, which explains the four backlit circles on the roof, one at each corner. Those are laser scanners, commonly referred to as lidar sensors, which protrude from the bodywork and scan the I.D.’s surroundings when the autonomous-driving mode is activated. The funniest thing happens at the same time: The steering wheel collapses and retracts into the dashboard. Activation requires pressing and holding the VW badge in the steering wheel for three seconds, at which point the I.D. Pilot takes over. When the wheel is deployed, it places every major control at the driver’s fingertips, from the park/drive/neutral/reverse gear selection to the turn signals and the infotainment options. Select park, and the wheel retracts again, ready to reemerge when the car reawakens.

Given how nebulous our current view of the regulatory environment nearly a decade from now, we’re filing the I.D. Pilot feature under TBD. Fully autonomous cars may be technologically ready for prime time in a few years—or not—but it’s anyone’s guess how or when governments plan to integrate self-driving cars with conventional automobiles. A feature more likely to see fruition is an app-based package-delivery-to-car idea that resembles one already available from Volvo overseas. That program gives shippers temporary access to your car, which they locate via GPS, so that packages can be delivered wherever it is, even if you’re not around. Volkswagen also included some connected-car and connected-home solutions; for instance, your home’s security camera can feed the I.D.’s many displays, and there’s also a fully automated parking feature.

Another uncertainty is what Volkswagen’s standing will be, both financially and in the eyes of consumers, come the I.D.’s on-sale date. As fines from the diesel scandal mount and costs of fixing or buying back offending TDI models rise, will the I.D.’s future, or at least its design and capability, be compromised? And the I.D. will be only the first of 30 EVs the Volkswagen Group hopes to sell across multiple brands by 2025. Developing the I.D. will be a monumental undertaking, even for one of the world’s largest and most engineering-rich automakers. Chevrolet proved that a good, affordable EV can be done with the Bolt, although not nearly as much is riding on that car for General Motors as it is for Volkswagen and its I.D.