Renault’s new E-Scenic is a winner alright

Renault’s all-electric new Scenic model proudly boasts the Car of the Year 2024 award and for Renault it’s the second time that the Scenic has taken the award. This time, the Scenic story is very different as the all-electric E-Tech Scenic has been pitched against some impressive competition. Why was the E-Scenic so successful?

In a world that is moving fast in the direction of electrified cars, this new E-Scenic needed to answer lots of questions. The car needed driving range, flexibility and ease of charging, coupled with style and safety features to come out on top of the competition.

I’ve had the new E-Scenic on the road recently and after 970km of driving, without fear of range anxiety, it was a car that I was reluctant to return. The engineering behind this new E-Scenic allows for realistic range ability that for me delivered 560km across a mix of motorway and rural road driving conditions. That’s lower than the rated range of 625km while it’s a very acceptable range in real Irish driving conditions.

Out on the roads where there is access to fast charging, the E-Scenic quickly delivers a fast top-up giving 15% more battery range during a short coffee break. Home charging will be slower and those with a 7.4kw home charger can achieve a full charge overnight. Alternatively, if you’ve access to household or farm solar panels for daytime charging, then you’re more sorted than the rest of the world in terms of charging costs and in turn driving costs.

This E-Scenic uses new battery technology that makes it lighter than some of the competition, hence the impressive driving range. This has also helped the car to achieve a good acceleration performance of 7.9 seconds in a 0 to 100km/hr race.

This E-Scenic is a very impressive family car to drive. There is good seat comfort and flexibility, while the boot space is larger than some of the competition.

The initial reaction to the large screen can be a little daunting but pick the bits that you need, and the result is a little less distracting when you get used to the car. The dash layout is modern and there are lots of tactile buttons under the large and suitably driver angled central screen for day-to-day use, heating controls, etc and they are clear to use. The steering wheel design is very practical and comfortable to use, making this a very relaxing car to drive.

Battery electric cars are not noted for their towing ratings, while this new Renault E-Scenic scores higher than many of the competition with a 1.1 tonne braked trailer rating. I can’t confirm what impact a trailer will have on battery range, and truthfully, I haven’t seen many battery electric cars with towbars fitted, but they can.

This award-winning Renault E-Scenic also came out top of the class in terms of safety ratings long before the car was officially on sale. The latest Euro NCAP rating gave the E-Scenic a top five-star award, helped by up to 30 advanced driver warning systems and seven airbags, on board.

Entry prices start at €39,995 or £37,495 in N Ireland, after Government grant support, for the lower 420km range versions. If you want the full range 625km ability in the 87kw version then you’ll have to dig deeper for the extra €9,000 in cost, and that’s the expensive bit. Renault car prices have been relatively stable in recent years and a quick reference check showed that in 2021 a similar diesel powered Scenic was priced at €36,520 and the 900km range would cost about €85 to fill at the pumps. With home charging and good charging management, the new generation E-Scenic can easily beat this in terms of running costs.

Overall, this new Renault E-Scenic is a very impressive and comfortable car to drive. The car has a five-year warranty and eight years cover on the battery. The car also rates your eco driving and safety performance after each journey; I felt that 96% and 93% ratings, respectively, meant that I was doing something right that week.

When pitched against the competition, the range, safety and comfort features, all packaged in a modern and spacious car, this makes the Renault E-Scenic the worthy Car of the Year 2024 winner that it is.

Ratings out of 10

Despite being listed on the Ploughing 2024 programme and following on from a telephone interview with a representative of Tesla in Ireland detailing their exhibiting plans, some Journal readers were disappointed that Tesla had a no show at this year’s National Ploughing Championships.

We received a late email from Tesla, after we had gone to press, to inform us of their decision. It was also too late to make changes to the programme for the event, meaning that the opportunity to see the Tesla Cybertruck was unfortunately denied to Ploughing visitors.