Before I got into EVs, I was into hypermiling. When everyone else around the shop and the school parking lot were talking about getting more power and lower times, I started to wonder if there was a way to come up with a more efficient commuter that wasn’t a busted Geo Metro that couldn’t sustain highway cruising and air conditioning simultaneously. I got to the point where I was getting 35 MPG out of a V6 Fiero .
So, while we ruthlessly mocked the Hummer EV here for having a giant battery pack and not that much range, GM may have ended up getting the last laugh with the Silverado EV. We don’t know the exact size of the battery, but it’s estimated to be well over 200 kWh! This sounds absurd, but when you want the truck to actually do truck stuff and not act as a mall crawler, a big battery pack and a non-teardrop shape ends up being the right answer.
An unloaded Cybertruck was running behind the Silverado EV for use as a camera car, and even unloaded, the Tesla was having limited regenerative braking! So, GM clearly has things a little more figured out.