Powering Peugeot Sport’s Hypercar to a podium finish

Peugeot Sport’s racing team are making a dramatic return to the ultra-competitive FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) and the most prestigious race: 24H of Le Mans. Thanks to Saft’s winning track record in developing batteries for kinetic energy recovery systems (KERS) in Formula 1 cars, we were in pole position for this new challenge.

The Peugeot-TotalEnergies Hypercar is a hybrid race car, with the rear wheels driven by an internal combustion engine and the front wheels driven by electric motors. The lithium-ion battery shares the same DNA as a road-going sport utility vehicle (SUV). But the similarity ends there. Because the Hypercar battery is race-bred to deliver the ultimate performance in terms of fast-charging and regenerative braking while taking a pounding from lapping the circuit hour after hour.
The regulations stipulate a 200 kW limit on battery power. The key to success was to deliver it in the most compact, lightweight and robust package. The development program involved a collaboration between Saft’s cell team in Poitiers, France, the battery team in Cockeysville, US and the TotalEnergies and Peugeot Sport race engineers. Mathieu Bellé, Saft Sales Technical Manager Space & Defense – Advanced Systems, explains:

“It was great to bring together the TotalEnergies and Peugeot Sport engineers who live to win races and Saft’s development teams who live to build better batteries. The race engineers made it clear that yesterday’s technology does not win tomorrow’s races. That called on us to challenge and justify every design decision along the way. That covered every step from cell selection through battery construction to the battery management system (BMS) that interfaces the battery to the vehicle.”

When building the battery even the tiniest screw was reviewed. Because it’s that sort of attention to detail that puts race drivers on the podium. The result is a battery that delivers maximum power rapidly from the most compact and lightweight package possible.

Mathieu Bellé concludes:

“Working on the Hypercar enabled us to learn just how much performance we can extract from a battery when facing the very highest expectations. Collaborating with TotalEnergies and Peugeot Sport is also great for building our reputation in the wider automotive world. Especially as we just launched the Automotive Cells Company, the TotalEnergies/Saft and Stellantis joint venture which seeks to become Europe’s number one battery manufacturer for electric vehicles.” 

Mathieu.belle@saftbatteries.com