In the world of cars, people have gotten used to describing vehicular power via how many cylinders it has: four, six, eight, etc. Audi is looking to change that by supplementing cylinder power with an electric turbocharger. This is like saying that instead of loading up on a big Thanksgiving meal, you’ll have a regular dinner along with an energy-rich fruit smoothie. By consuming less while upping the energy intake, vehicles won’t have to consume nearly as much fossil fuels to provide power on demand.
The twist is the use of electricity in the turbochargers. Regular turbochargers have existed for years by using hot engine gases to spin a tiny fan called a turbine. An electric turbocharger would spin the turbine immediately without having to wait for the gases, eliminating the “turbo lag” experienced by engines today.
This is the future of engines. As pressure on automakers builds to increase miles per gallon, smaller and lighter engines that creatively repurpose energy will become the norm. What’s great about Audi is that this isn’t a technology that it’s just poking around in 2014. Audi has been working on this for the RS5 Coupe Prototype, a fancy performance-centered model that can’t afford to cut corners when it comes to engineering. Audi is now saying that we can expect to this technology, called “e-boost,” in SQ7 in 2016.
The SQ7 is performance-centered, a large vehicle, and a mass-seller. These are three marks of confidence that show e-boost is a delicate technology for a bug-like electric car. Rather, it’s a dependable component that can shoulder the duty of daily American driving. As e-boost improves, we can imagine an engine where each cylinder has its own electric turbocharger, or perhaps each wheel. Whatever the combination, we like that this is low-cost way to boost performance while saving fuel and reducing emissions. Hats off to Audi’s team.