The first “retrofitted” car, the Henney Kilowatt, was manufactured in the United States in 1959 with General Electric batteries borrowed from Fenwick forklifts, mounted on the chassis of a… Renault Dauphine! Produced in 47 copies, of which 32 were service cars for electric companies, the Henney had a range of 75 kilometers. A Strasbourg-Colmar. In use, the model has proven to be robust since in 2022 two copies continued to roll according to Renault…
What should we expect from the retrofit today? If the government announced aid of 20 million euros to the sector during the Paris Motor Show in October, only a hundred thermal vehicles have to date been converted to electric.
More than 5 years of gray card minimum
There is a simple reason for this: before being able to transform the engine of a vehicle, the “retrofitters”, who have the status of car manufacturer, must have each model approved. To date, only three of them have obtained six approvals. On the two-wheel side, the Solex and the Peugeot 103 moped; on the four-wheel side, there are the 2 CV, the 2 CV van, the Renault 4L (collector cars) and the Renault Trafic for utility vehicles. In addition, to be “retrofitted”, a car must necessarily have more than five years of registration behind it. It’s the law.
“There are technical constraints, in particular for safety reasons. We must therefore respect the maximum power and the total empty weight of the original vehicle. Our approach is to have series homologation to evolve on an industrial scale. and reduce costs”, explains Aymeric Libeau, co-president of the Association of Electric Retrofit Players and founder of Transition-One, a company that is working to approve several city cars (Clio 3, Twingo 2, Mini, Polo 4, Fiat 500, etc. ) and a utility (Kangoo 2). “We are working on 14 models. The first could be on the road at the end of 2023 or the beginning of 2024”, explains the manager, who has Mobivia (parent company of Norauto and Midas) in its capital. Still, the research and development time is quite long for the dozen French neo-builders of electrical retrofits.
“The organization of supply chain and engineering take a year, to which must be added three months of approval”, explains Arnaud Pigounides, founder of Rev Mobilities, which plans to approve eight light vehicles, including classic cars, utilities, buses and trucks. next year.” Some conurbations have announced their desire to retrofit their fleet. There will be calls for tenders to which it will be necessary to be able to respond”, continues the manager of this Ile-de-France company, which intends to rely on networks of partner dealers to transform the vehicles, but also to ensure their maintenance.
“Between 8,000 and 50,000 euros”
As the second-hand electric market does not yet exist, retrofit professionals target in particular local authorities, utility fleet rental companies and individuals living in low-emission zones who do not necessarily have the capacity to buy an electric vehicle. new.
There remains the price barrier, because it takes “between 8,000 and 50,000 euros” depending on the manufacturers and depending on the model, to retrofit a vehicle. With the aid of the State (2,500 or 5,000 euros depending on the conditions of resources) and sometimes that of local authorities such as in the South Paca Region or Auvergne Rhône-Alpes, an additional 2,500 euros in subsidy can be gleaned.
It’s still cheaper than a new electric vehicle… But not within reach of all budgets either. “We have to be able to offer a vehicle with a remaining charge of between 6,000 and 8,000 euros for this to raise questions among the motorist”, estimates Jérôme Bousquet, director of XAP Technology, who works from Gard in the transformation of Peugeot 205, 106 and a Citroën C15 utility vehicle. While electric vehicles now account for 12% of sales, retrofitting, which represents barely 1% of the fleet, has immense potential ahead of it… All that remains is to convince motorists to move up a gear.