Why the solar-powered, aerodynamic Aptera has caught my attention

So much automotive innovation has sprung from Southern California’s long-standing performance community that we’ve become used to seeing their once radical concepts change the world’s automotive industry. The latest chapter involves a sustainable mobility solution that maximizes efficiency using the universe’s most obvious power source, the sun!

In 2007, Aptera CEO Steve Fambro chose the design team, led by Jason Hill of the Eleven LLC design group in Costa Mesa, to create an ultra-efficient shape by using truly advanced aerodynamic data developed by professor Alberto Morelli of the Politecnico di Torino in Italy. 

As a result, today’s 2025 Aptera has the least amount of aerodynamic drag when compared to any other production vehicle in the world. Recently tested at the Pininfarina wind tunnel in Italy, the latest refined iteration of the Aptera’s unique form registered an astounding 0.14 coefficient of drag. Aptera’s co-CEO, Chris Anthony, pointed out that the Aptera’s CD number is currently more than twice as efficient as some of the finest, most technically advanced production cars in the world.

Using today’s latest solar technology, the Aptera’s engineering team, led by Senior Director Tim Dine, was able to extract some 40 miles of sun-powered travel per day from 700 watts of embedded cells in the Aptera’s upper surfaces. That works out to some 11,000 miles of free travel per year! If needed, a 44-kilowatt battery gives the Aptera’s basic model another 400 miles of range depending on available daily sunlight. Full recharge is just under 15 minutes at most existing recharge facilities. A full 1000-miles-per-charge unit is planned as a future option.

The public appearance of Aptera’s Typ-1 in 2007 brought such a strong wave of interest from enthusiastic potential owners that thousands of unsolicited offers to place orders poured in. This encouraged Aptera’s management to create the corporation that has now grown to some 15 major industrial partners from Japan, Korea, Europe and the U.S., all of which will contribute to the Aptera’s production. 

It’s been this popular show of support that has fueled the Aptera’s developmental progress, making it ready for limited production at the firm’s pilot plant in Carlsbad, California. Full mass production in Italy, where the chassis and body were developed by the Costamp Group, will continue there for at least another two years until the American facility is established in a larger location to ease delivery and assembly of major components. 

Now that the Aptera has gone through no fewer than 15 developmental refinements and continual upgrades, each matching the latest emerging solar and electric technologies, I believe it is now the most advanced, carefully thought-out road vehicle of any type currently set for production. 

In the meantime, Aptera’s current facility in Carlsbad is expecting to deliver its first 58 pre-production units until its 130-cars-per-month goal is reached to satisfy the first few thousand loyal, long-patient depositors starting in late 2025. 

Aptera’s highly visible debut of its latest model at the CES show in Las Vegas has now put it squarely in front of a mostly unsuspecting general public, which has little real awareness that solar power would be the next evolutionary cycle of the modern automobile. All of this was quietly created so as not to incur the obvious negative realities of insufficient infrastructure to support enough electric power. But, most importantly, no pollutants of any kind will result from any Aptera on the road.

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