Electric vehicles are easier on the environment but tougher on crash testing equipment because their batteries are so heavy.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety wanted to make sure its testing lab was up to the task. So, rather than buying an actual, very expensive EV, it strapped concrete blocks and steel plates to “some old junkers” and simulated one, said Raul Arbelaez, vice president of the IIHS Vehicle Research Center.
Some of the EVs coming in the years ahead are expected to weigh up to 9,500 pounds, “which is huge,” Arbelaez said in a YouTube video. “That’s much bigger than anything we’ve seen. We wanted to make sure that we could crash them here.”
He didn’t say which vehicle the institute had in mind, but the GMC Hummer EV Edition 1 has a curb weight of 9,063 pounds, and the SUV version coming next year is expected to be even heavier.
