Why we’re running it: To find out how relaxed it can make you feel about a UK charging network that has so few places for a PHEV to plug in
Month 1 - Specs
Life with a Citroen C5 Aicrosss: Month 1
Welcoming the C5 Aicross to the fleet - 25 January 2022
Picture this. It’s late in the evening, you’ve been travelling all day and you’ve just come off a long flight with miles yet to cover before bed. You don’t want to drive, you just need transport, and the comfier, roomier and easier-going it is the better. More often than not you’re stuck with the last Ubers left in the rank, but just occasionally the airport taxi of your dreams heaves into view and sweeps you serenely off on your onward journey as if on the wings of angels.
That superbly relaxed, comfy-as-they-come vibe is the heart and soul of the appeal of my new long-term test car, a Citroën C5 Aircross.
Citroën facelifted the big SUV early last year, adding new lights, a new front grille and some interior design revisions, but the crucial update for the plug-in hybrid version came later, last autumn, when battery capacity rose by just enough to put the car into an 8% benefit-in-kind tax bracket. It became at a stroke one of not very many sub-£40,000 family SUVs to be so tax-efficient. Now it will be under consideration by a lot of drivers (and for very sound, rational reasons) who would be new to Citroën.
I’m not, having had the pleasure of running a Berlingo a couple of years ago, its no-nonsense space and versatility suiting me very well.
Quite honestly, a PHEV probably isn’t such a perfect fit for me, because I can’t charge one at home. But that won’t stop legions of people in similar circumstances from running a car just like this, because the system incentivises them to. And if PHEVs don’t work for everyone, while at the same time saving more money for richer folk with solar panels on their roofs, driveways to park on and the like, I would say that’s well worth writing about.
So the C5 Aircross PHEV now has a new-generation battery with 1kWh of extra storage in it. It can supposedly do up to 41 electric-only miles on a charge – a claim that I will have to go out of my way to investigate as we go.
I’ve selected the lighter-equipped Shine trim level, which is claimed to have greater potential for economy and electric running than the C-Series Edition. But on either version, it’s possible to option your car well out of that important 8% tax bracket, so this is a car to order with care.
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Such a great looking car, especially in white and blue
Toyota's excellent self-charging system is surely more practical and, with that more efficient, for a majority of potential hybrid buyers.