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Ford’s Mustang-inspired EV will travel more than 300 miles on a full battery

Ford’s Mustang-inspired EV will travel more than 300 miles on a full battery

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The long-range SUV will debut later this year, and ships in 2020

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Photo: Ford Motor Company

Ford’s first long-range electric vehicle — an SUV inspired by the Mustang muscle car due out in 2020 — will likely travel more than 300 miles on a single charge, the company announced Tuesday. The car was first teased at the 2018 Detroit Auto Show, and has been in development under the codename “Mach 1.”

Ford executives have often stated, as far back as 2017, that they hope to offer more than 300 miles in the company’s first mass-market EV. (The company has sold shorter range all-electric Focus hatchbacks and Ranger trucks in the past.) With Tuesday’s announcement, it appears that they’ll do just that. Ford says the still-unnamed car will eclipse 600 kilometers, or about 370 miles, based on Europe’s Worldwide Harmonized Light Vehicle Test Procedure (WLTP).

Expect something closer to 300 miles in the real world, though

But don’t count on ever hitting that 370-mile figure if you’re saving up for this car.

The WLTP standard was put in place in 2018 to help evaluate the energy consumption of every car on the road, including the range of EVs. While it’s more strict than the outdated standard it replaced, WLTP estimates are still typically more optimistic than the ones generated by the Environmental Protection Agency in the United States.

It’s hard to say what estimate the EPA will arrive at purely based on the WLTP one. The Jaguar I-Pace got a WLTP rating of about 292 miles, and wound up with an EPA range of 240 miles. By that ratio, Ford’s EV might wind up with a range closer to 300 miles. Other WLTP and EPA comparisons show a narrower difference between the two estimates that can extrapolate to something more like 330 miles.

Either way, anything above 300 miles will be good enough to put Ford near the top of the EV range leaderboard. Tesla is currently the only company that sells an electric car (multiple cars, in fact) with more than 300 miles of range, as the first serious EVs from companies like Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Jaguar, Hyundai, and Kia all hover between 200 miles and 260 miles.

That will change when Porsche’s first all-electric cars hit the road around the end of this year, and as other major automakers further develop their electric drivetrain technology. While Ford has been derided for falling behind competitors when it comes to developing electric cars, the Mustang-inspired EV is shaping up to be the kind of thing that could prove worth the wait. And with more than $10 billion committed to electrifying Ford’s lineup, the car could jump-start a new era for the company — a turnaround the automaker could use in what are otherwise tough times in Dearborn.