IBERDROLA and SEAT Enter into Collaboration Agreement on Electrical Mobility

-Second stage of assigning electric vehicles to corporate fleets
-Car maker delivers e-Altea model to IBERDROLA today, a 100% electric vehicle
-Six employees from energy company to take part in collaboration programme until end of 2013

SEAT has entered into an agreement with IBERDROLA, under the terms of which it made one of its prototype electric vehicles available to the utility today. To be more specific, the car maker provided IBERDROLA with an Altea XL Electric Ecomotive, the first 100% electric Spanish car. In the coming months, the utility is also expected to test drive a plug-in hybrid model, the León TwinDrive Ecomotive, as part of this collaboration project. This means that IBERDROLA is taking part in the second stage of fleet tests launched by SEAT with a view to optimising the features of its electric vehicles.

The Sales Director of IBERDROLA, Aitor Moso, received the dynamic prototype at the utility’s headquarters in Madrid, from the Vice-Chairman of Government and Institutional Relations for SEAT and the Volkswagen Group in Spain, Ramón Paredes. André Koropp, Automotive Institutions Manager at SEAT, has also attended the event.

Moso pointed out that this initiative would enable IBERDROLA to learn more about how this type of vehicles operate. “With the help of a leading state-of-the-art company like SEAT, we can now make new progress in improving the charging systems on electric vehicles and continue to offer solutions that help to make electrical mobility a reality, with business models that are innovative and sustainable".

Ramón Paredes explained that IBERDROLA’s sustainable management is aligned with the ultimate goal of the pilot tests being carried out by SEAT: “IBERDROLA is a company with a strong environmental focus in all of its activities. Therefore, its participation in the assessment stage strengthens the meaning of SEAT’s electromobility project, which aims to contribute towards improving the quality of the environment by promoting sustainable mobility and bringing down CO2 emissions".

Six employees from IBERDROLA will be taking part in the pilot test on a voluntary basis, each one for a three-month period in the year 2013. During this time, the SEAT Technical Centre will receive information on speed, acceleration, battery status or charging habits. The technical information, together with the opinions and personal feelings of each driver, will help to assess electric vehicle performance and detect possible areas of improvement before commencing mass-scale production.

In this second stage of assigning electric vehicles to fleets run by companies and institutions, in which other organisations such as the utility Endesa or El Port de Barcelona are already taking part, SEAT is analysing the change in driving habits compared to cars with combustion engines.

e-Altea XL and León TwinDrive, SEAT’s first electric vehicles

The León TwinDrive Ecomotive and the Altea XL Electric Ecomotive are two vehicles equipped with different but complementary technology. The new SEAT León TwinDrive combines the advantages of emission-free driving with the range of a traditional internal combustion engine vehicle. In electric mode, the TwinDrive has a range of 52 kilometres, with a top speed of 120 kph. In combined mode (electrical plus combustion) the expected consumption is only 1.7 litres of fuel per 100 kms, the equivalent of 39 g/km of CO2 emissions, with a top speed of 170 kph.

The e-Altea XL is SEAT’s first all-electric vehicle. It offers a range of 135 kilometres, an engine power of 115 CV (85kW) and a torque of 270 Nm. This amount of power translates into a limited top speed of 135 kph. Some of its innovative features include a smartphone app, which allows to schedule the vehicle charges and control the regeneration system that regulates the interior temperature in advance, thanks to the photovoltaic cells installed in the roof, thus reducing the need for energy consumption by the vehicle’s air-conditioning system.

SEAT is the only company in its sector with the full-range capacity to design, develop, manufacture and market cars in Spain. A member of the Volkswagen Group, the multinational has its headquarters in Martorell (Barcelona), exporting approximately 83% of its vehicles and with operations in 77 countries. In 2012, SEAT recorded a turnover amounting to €6,000 million, with total sales of 321,000 vehicles.

The SEAT Group employs 14,000 professionals at its three production centres: Zona Franca, El Prat de Llobregat and Martorell (Barcelona), where it manufactures the highly successful Ibiza and Leon, amongst other models. The company also produces the Alhambra model in Palmela (Portugal), the Mii in Bratislava (Slovakia) and the Toledo in Mladá Boleslav (Czech Republic), at plants that belong to the Volkswagen Group.

The Spanish multinational also has a Technical Centre, a ‘knowledge hub’ bringing together more than 900 engineers whose goal is to be the driving force behind innovation for the number one industrial investor in R&D+i in Spain. In line with its commitment to environmental protection, SEAT carries out its core activity according to criteria of sustainability in relation to CO2 emissions, energy efficiency, as well as recycling and the reuse of resources.

With a track record reaching back over 100 years, IBERDROLA is a company with some 31,000 employees, operations in dozens of countries on four continents and almost 32 million customers. It is currently the premier Spanish energy group, one of the highest-ranked companies in the Ibex 35 index, one of the leading names in the wind power sector and one of the world’s top utilities.

In 2012 IBERDROLA obtained a profit of €2,840.7 million, thanks to its international operations. Its installed capacity is currently 46,039 megawatts, produced by a balanced, efficient and well-diversified generation pool that ensures it is well-positioned to respond to any energy scenario.

IBERDROLA is one of the pioneers in promoting electric mobility in Spain, having set up the Green Mobility Plan to offer users the possibility of purchasing an electric vehicle on hire purchase, including the installation of the charging point and a 100% renewable energy supply. As well as developing various R&D projects in the field of electrical mobility and entering into agreements with public administrations, the company also set up the first rental scheme for corporate electric vehicles in Spain, launched the first public e-Carsharing scheme in Spain and installed a total of 159 charging points in the year 2012.