The Government’s announcement of its timescale for the phasing out of new cars powered solely by normal combustion engines is likely to have changed a few people’s outlook on the electric vehicle.
Until now, you might have considered EVs to be interesting if immature alternatives to ‘normal’ cars, entirely pointless irrelevances doomed to obscurity, or something in between.
But now, with one eye on that 2040 deadline, you are unlikely to consider them unimportant.
It’s a good time, then, to update ourselves on the pace of progress in the EV market – and to see how well a current electric powertrain can be deployed in a car serving a brief different from that of a typical five-door family hatchback, big-selling supermini, fast luxury saloon or SUV.
The Smart Forfour Electric Drive is plainly intended to broaden the reach of the EV rather than necessarily transform its sales success – perhaps finally to be that perfect vehicular urbanite which zero-emissions technology always seemed fated to provide.
Although it’s actually a fourth-generation electric Smart car, this is the first four-seat Smart EV and comes to market as part of a three-pronged assault alongside Electric Drive versions of the Smart Fortwo Coupé and Smart Fortwo Cabriolet.
Smart’s unswerving focus on urban mobility remains a defining strength for the brand, and it has been using electric powertrains to make its cars even better suited to city motoring since 2007. But this is the first time we’ve run the road test ruler over one of them – or, indeed, any version of the current Forfour.
