Introducing the BYD Atto 1: South Africa's most affordable electric car arriving soon
Mostly, South Africans are turning to hybrid cars, with full BEVs seen as being expensive, and despite a relatively high number of charging stations, range anxiety is still a thing.
From an initial slow uptake of Battery Electric Vehicles (BEVs) in South Africa, they're starting to make some inroads with a substantial year-on-year growth, albeit from a low base.
Urban EV
However, BEVs do make sense as a city runabout, which makes the announcement by BYD that it will be introducing the compact EV Atto 1 to South Africa, called the Dolphin Mini elsewhere, an interesting proposition.
According to BYD, it's tailor-made for urban life to make EV ownership affordable, accessible, and fun for more South Africans.
Grade levels
BYD have not indicated which model they will be bringing in, but there are two available with the entry-level GL and higher-specced GS version.
The GL is reportedly fitted with BYD's Blade battery with 30.1kWh and an estimated WLTP range of 250 kilometres, and the GS has a 38.9kWh battery with a WLTP range of 322 kilometres.
At this stage, it's still speculation, and we'll know more once a launch date has been confirmed.
Blade battery
According to BYD, their Blade battery (it looks like a blade) provides superior safety, durability and performance.
It uses lithium iron phosphate rather than lithium-ion batteries.
They have put it through the Nail Penetration Test to test battery thermal runaway, simulating a serious accident.
The Blade Battery gave off no smoke or fire, and the surface temperature only reached 30-60 degrees Celsius. In more tests that included being crushed, bent, heated in an oven to 300 degrees and overloaded by 260 percent there was no fire or explosion.
BYD says it's aimed at students, young professionals, first-time buyers and city-based families.
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