The e-Palette, Toyota’s autonomous (and inevitably electric) shuttle, is one step closer to the of the future as our ancestors imagined it. Not a flying car, of course, but a multitasking vehicle that can adapt to any situation.
Let’s delve into our childhood memories: a comic strip, a film, a book about the future.
« future ». There’s no escaping flying cars, no escaping ‘intelligent’ robots, and no escaping omnipresent
ubiquitous screens, ditto. And, more often than not, in this fantasised future, people no longer
on the cow floor in a car. No, they climb into autonomous vehicles
autonomous vehicles, which can be fitted out as they please and asked to go anywhere.
anywhere. Toyota has ticked that last box with the e-Pallet.
Initially used in prototype form at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 as a showcase for the Japanese giant’s technological know-how, it will finally see the light of day, « for real ».
the Japanese giant’s technological know-how, it will finally see the light of day, « for real »,
first in Japan, before perhaps conquering the world. Of course, its prohibitive price tag
of €165,000 makes it primarily a vehicle for connected cities, or those in the process of becoming ‘smarter’.
« These are likely to flourish over the next 10 years.
Ultra-modular architecture
Enough chit-chat about the concept, the idea, the motivations. Now that it’s really coming out, we can
we can talk about something concrete. This Toyota e-Pallet is almost 5 metres long, 2.65 metres high
and 2 metres wide. That’s plenty of space inside, but the reduced driving position
and the absence of an imposing combustion engine. More than volume, it’s above all
the e-Palette’s versatility.
It’s like a blank sheet of paper on wheels, so you can transform it as you wish, depending on how you want to use it.
as you like, depending on what you want to use it for: a medical vehicle, a mobile pop-up
mobile pop-up store, taxi lounge, why not a coffee-shop or simply an XXL trunk?
In short, we can imagine it transporting patients from one hospital wing to another, or simply
from the airport to their hotel in a cosy space,
enabling a shop to pick up customers rather than bringing them in, or delivering parcels.
parcel delivery.
All with enough power to go the distance. The e-Palette is equipped with a battery of almost
73 kWh battery and a 150 kW electric motor. Not enough to set the Le Mans race
Le Mans, but it is claimed to have a range of nearly 250 km. That’s pretty good for a commuter! And
to be really useful all the way, Toyota has thought of the possibility of transforming its e-Palette into an electric generator if required.
e-Palette into an electric generator if required.
100% autonomous by 2027?
In the introduction, I talked about autonomy. Then, later in the article, I mentioned the driving
driving position. It’s not a mistake on my part, I’m just getting ahead of myself.
For the time being, the e-Palette only benefits from level 2 assisted driving, which gives it a good deal of autonomy, but still requires a great deal of preparation.
This gives it a great deal of autonomy, but still requires the presence of a driver.
Level 4 autonomy, which enables the vehicle to be driven without a driver (on defined stretches of road known to the vehicle), will be available in the future.
known to the vehicle) is planned by Toyota for 2027. That’s tomorrow.
A pioneer in hybrids when no-one believed in them, then in ‘smart cities’ with its Woven
City, when it was just a distant idea, Toyota continues to give us glimpses of the future before anyone else.
the future before anyone else, this time with a simple electric shuttle that we could well see (it or the models that follow it).
be seen on our streets in large numbers in the next decade.
decade.
