What’s in store for the Gen II Volt?

GM has said a few things about future Volts, but really it amounts to very little. We know the company is working to cut costs, is using the Volt as a development platform, and it’s believed no Voltec derivatives will come before 2015, but what opportunities exist now or near term?

That’s anyone’s guess, but last week two educated guesses were offered by both a writer who’s penned pieces for Popular Mechanics, and his interview subject, a former GM tech director who has since formed his own company.

According to auto writer Gary Witzenburg’s AutoblogGreen interview with, Jon Bereisa, GM’s former director of Advanced Engineering & Technology Strategy, cutting the Volt’s costs and reducing petroleum consumption are presently doable.

Bereisa’s opinion comes after having had his hands in developing the EV1, two-mode hybrid system, and other GM electric vehicles including the Voltec project.

In 2009 he founded Auto Lectrification LLC, and his views are now from the supply side of the industry. As president and CEO, his company stands to gain from the Volt’s advances, but his observations and speculations on cost cutting and efficiency are informative nonetheless.

“The mission was to build the car as fast as we could, which meant using existing parts as much as possible,” Bereisa told Witzenburg. “When you use available components, you’re probably carrying a little more cost and mass than you need, since every component had to do something else, probably in a larger vehicle. So I think literally thousands of dollars can come out of that car, and by the time they get to Gen II, it’ll be a very cost-effective proposition.”

GM has said the battery costs can come down, and Bereisa confirmed this from what he knows.

“About 70 percent of that is cell cost,” he said of the Volt’s battery pack. “I think we’ll see that down to maybe $200 per kwh in two to three years, even without major innovations. And I foresee at least twice the energy density in five to seven years.”

Nor is Bereisa any less optimistic with regards to the Volt’s gasoline generator.

“When we modeled the Volt’s engine, theoretically we could have gotten to high 40s or low 50s mpg in gasoline mode. But we would have had to run it continuously at 3500-3800 rpm and just switch it on and off, and the noise and pleasability wouldn’t work,” Bereisa said. “We had to drop it down, which got us to 37-38 mpg. But I think a lot of fuel economy still can be gained without major expenditures in tooling or engineering.”

Gasoline consumption could be radically cut also, he said, by switching fuels – something GM has said it has no current plans to do.

“You can take it to Brazil, up its compression and have a pure alcohol E100 engine. The rest of the vehicle stays the same,” Bereisa said.”Europeans are in love with biodiesel, so you can use a small direct-injected diesel running on biodiesel fuel. [Eventually] you can take out the engine, generator and battery pack and put a hydrogen fuel cell in front and two hydrogen tanks in back, while the rest stays the same.”

Or less radically, GM could convert the engine to run on E85 – 85-percent ethanol, 15-percent gasoline.

“Today, the average Volt drive is a little over 1,000 miles before refueling. And when the owners refuel, they add back about eight gallons, so that computes to approximately 125 mpg,” he said. “But with E85, only 15 percent of that gallon of fuel is petroleum-based gasoline, so on a gasoline-usage basis, that’s 125 mpg times roughly six, or about 750 mpg … a HUGE improvement! E85 applied to the Voltec architecture would do a phenomenal job of reducing the amount of petroleum being burned.”

The Volt could also stand to lose a few pounds, he said.

“The Volt came in at 1,600-plus kilos. My target was 1,500, with the battery. We borrowed components from other places, and it adds up,” he said.”So a lot can be done just in lightening, which will increase gasoline fuel economy as well as electric range.”

For his part, writer Gary Witzenburg, who has been covering autos, people and technology for 21 years, said his Volt outlook is more bearish.

Witzenburg said he could foresee the Volt getting the typical aero and styling update in three to four years after having also benefited from year-over-year incremental changes just as the 2012 was a minor update over 2011.

And forget about 2015 being the next big year. Witzenburg said the Volt would get “probably a complete makeover by 2017,” and that would be Gen II.

By 2017, Witzenburg says he believes the Gen II Volt will have somewhat improved energy density, and be better, less expensive, with a new appearance.

“The result will be a slightly smaller, much lighter, more fuel efficient and more affordable Volt that can run 35-50 miles on battery power, achieve mid-40s-mpg gasoline economy and sell in the low- to mid-$30Ks,” Witzenburg said. “I also foresee evolving Voltec technology proliferating to other GM vehicles, including larger cars, crossovers, even trucks. And other makers offering EREVs, beginning with Fisker.”

If what Witzenburg says is all that happens, it almost sounds like the initial design target for Gen I. Should he be more bullish?

What do you think?

Bereisa said the technology is here now to make the Volt better, but Witzenburg was not infected by his enthusiasm, even after interviewing him, and writing about some of his ideas.

Is Witzenburg’s relative pessimism justified?

GM’s Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson has said the company foresees a flat 2012 automotive selling year for its entire line-up, which it is prepared to ride out. GM has resisted even spending the money to buy its own stock back at a sub-IPO discount, and is building a “fortress balance sheet,” having been stung by a humbling near-death experience in just the past couple years.

Imbued with a new resolve and conservatism, selling new ICE models in large numbers, having shed legacy costs, and recently cutting a decent deal with the UAW, GM has said it is using the Volt as a showroom draw, even as it prepared to sell 60,000 Volts next year.

In other words, it is not talking about taking any big Voltec chances.

So, is it only pie-in-the-sky to talk about what could be? Or are some of the suggestions Bereisa mentions – or ones you could think of – worth doing?

Will GM surprise us and take chances it has said it is avoiding? Or not?

Source: GM-Volt.com