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I was watching TFL Trucks last night and they were testing a Rivian electric truck towing a flat bed trailer with a large pickup truck on the carrier up to the Ike Gap (from Boulder, CO) and back. I won't post a link here because these guys are seriously aero-ignorant but they had a result I found interesting.
Going downgrade and setting their cruise control to 60 mph they only gained a couple kWh and a few miles of range from the regenerative braking. They were very puzzled by this result. The following occurred to me.
1: Regenerative braking energy returns at speed is a function of aerodynamic drag and rolling resistance.
2: A lower drag shape with all the same parameters (frontal area and mass) would allow more regenerative braking energy returns.
3: That it should be possible to map and graph the potential for regenerative braking energy returns as a function of CDA, mass, and speed.
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