WHY DIDN'T I THINK OF THAT | Why electric cars do not have solar panels on the roof?
It's the question every electric vehicle owner has asked at least once — if solar panels work on houses, why don't they just put them on the roof of a car?
A car roof offers roughly eight to ten square metres of usable surface area — a fraction of what a household solar system needs to generate meaningful power.
A five-kilowatt rooftop solar system covering around 50 square metres takes roughly 20 hours of peak charging to fill a 100-kilowatt-hour battery, before accounting for inefficiencies.
And that's on a stationary roof angled directly at the sun, not a moving vehicle on a cloudy Perth morning.
But some of the world's biggest carmakers are now showing results that suggest solar-assisted EVs are closer to reality than ever.
Nissan recently unveiled a prototype at Japan Mobility Show 2025 fitting its top-selling Sakura EV with the 'Ao-Solar Extender' — a roof-mounted system that generates up to 3,000 kilometres of additional driving range annually.
When parked, a panel extends outward to increase surface area, generating up to 500 watts on a sunny day.
Even while driving, the system produces 300 watts in windy conditions and 80 watts on overcast days. Nissan says it intends to bring the system to market commercially.
Hyundai, Toyota and Nissan have all released or are actively developing EVs with solar roofs, with Hyundai offering the technology on the Sonata Hybrid and Ioniq 5, and Toyota offering an optional solar roof on the Prius Prime hybrid.
The benefits for sun-drenched cities like Perth are obvious.
Drivers in sunny areas who use solar EVs and have short commutes may find themselves charging from an outlet far less frequently.
Estimates suggest solar charging could add between 10 and 40 miles of daily range depending on the model and conditions.
The road to mainstream solar EVs has been littered with casualties. Dutch pioneer Lightyear went bankrupt, Germany's Sono Motors fought for its life, and Aptera teetered on the brink — all casualties of the brutal economics of building a niche vehicle around renewable energy technology.
For now, solar panels on EVs remain a range-extender rather than a solution to charging anxiety.
But with Nissan preparing to commercialise its extendable roof system and the global solar vehicle market projected to grow at over 15 per cent annually through to 2030, the technology is becoming a genuine selling point.
In a country with as much sunshine as Australia, it can't come soon enough.
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