• Monaco-based Venturi needed to send a special team to Antarctica to upgrade the Venturi Antarctica.
• This involved adding cooling to the vehicle for occupants and components.
• Further upgrades will be completed before next year to improve the EV’s range.

Being located in one of the coldest regions on Earth one would think that cooling wouldn’t be an issue but Monaco-based vehicle maker Venturi learned the hard way that it is.

The Venturi Antarctica is an electric vehicle that has been working around the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica research station since December 2021. Last month Venturi provided an update regarding the technical upgrades that have been made to the vehicle.

“At the end of 2022, with a new summer beginning in the southern hemisphere, the only zero emissions research station on the Antarctic continent welcomed a team from Venturi. The visitors made improvements to the first ever tracked electric vehicle to be driven on the white continent. These interventions were necessary. The vehicle was initially designed to operate in the Antarctic winter when temperatures of -50°C, whereas currently the conditions are warmer at -10°C,” reads a press release from the vehicle maker.

These higher temperatures mean that the vehicle needed a ventilation intake added to the body. Now passengers are able to reduce the interior temperature when the electronics and sun generate too much heat.

Those electronics which drive the vehicle also needed cooling and intakes as well as vents were added to the front and rear of the vehicle.

Venturi isn’t done upgrading the vehicle as yet. Right now the consistency of the snow in the region limits the range of the vehicle but this will be addressed in the next upgrade. To date the vehicle has travelled 500km across the Antarctica tundra.

In addition to adding vents, Venturi’s team also replace the sprockets that drive the tracks to prevent snow from sticking to the parts and leading to unwanted vibrations.

“The Venturi Antarctica is the perfect fit for the zero emission concept of the Princess Elisabeth station. It’s an important advantage for the scientists and the team working at the station. This vehicle can be used for field missions while being recharged by the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica station’s renewable energy sources,” commented head of the Antarctic Research Expeditions (BELARE) and founder of the International Polar Foundation, Alain Hubert.

Venturi’s President, Gildo Pastor, says that the Venturi team will return to the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica research station in less than a year to conduct further optimisations.

Earlier this year Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment Barbara Creecy, visited the same research facility to learn more about how South Africa can improve its presence in Antarctica.

The southern most landmass on the planet proved to be rather popular in December and January attracting a number of tourists thanks to coverage online and warmer temperatures making the area more hospitable.