The virtues of electric cars are, currently, well known by most of the population. However, manufacturers do not give up their efforts to show that they have nothing to envy of cars with traditional internal combustion engines. To this end, numerous brands continue to strive to overcome milestones that prove it.
One of these milestones, turned into an adventure, has just been achieved by Porsche. And the German brand has achieved the Guinness record for the greatest change in altitude made by an electric car thanks to a journey with two units of its Taycan Cross Turismo. The challenge lasted 10 days and started Lake Ayding, located in Chinese territory at an altitude of 218.8 meters below sea level.
From that point, the expedition began to ascend and culminated with the arrival at the Tibetan summit of Hongtu Daban, a place located 5,355 meters above sea level. During the trip, a total of 2,783 km were traveled, which was by no means easy. It should be noted that the difficult terrain of the different regions that had to be crossed are among the most demanding in the world for automobiles.
Canyons, forests and deserts were some of the many landscapes they crossed, many of them on bumpy dirt and gravel surfaces. During the trip, the two Taycans had to endure significant climatic contrasts, with sudden changes in both temperature and atmospheric pressure, without forgetting the passage on extremely dry surfaces and on wet and even icy ones.
As expected, the route not only presented geographical and climatic challenges but also when it came to recharging the electric vehicles. The various DC and AC charging stations located along the road ranged from 120 kW to 22 kW. One of the most complicated sections in this sense was found in the Kunlun and Tianshan mountains with a 760 km section located in inhospitable and isolated areas.
Four days were needed to cover this complex sector, in which the expedition had the collaboration of EnjoyElec, a start-up that guaranteed the necessary recharge during those days. In addition to encountering sudden rain and unexpected snowfall, the cars faced four consecutive peaks with an altitude of more than 4,900 meters along that stretch.
Taking into account the climb overcome during the ten days, the two Taycans achieved an altitude change of 5,573.9 meters during a single trip (taking as reference the starting point, which was located below sea level). The achievement is now inscribed in the Guinness Book and the Porsche model has thus broken the world record for cumulative altitude ever achieved by an electric car.
Among the details reported by the German firm is the fact that autonomy can continue to increase even at altitudes above 4,000 meters thanks to the energy recovery system that integrates the Taycan.
If you are interested in knowing in detail how this great Asian adventure developed, you can do so in the video that accompanies this article.
