BMW i8 Spied

The BMW i8 being filmed for BMW TV

We have a spy photo of the new BMW i8, the £150k eco-supercar bound for a showroom near you in 2013.

Just the other day we brought you the BMW i3 out playing in Scandinavia so, to complete the set, we thought we’d add to that with the BMW i8 doing exactly the same.

These photos of the i8 being snapped in the snow are being reported as camouflaged cold-weather testing for BMW’s new “i” range of cars. Which – if you look carefully at the front of the i8 above – would seem unlikely.

Although you probably can’t make it out, the front plate says “BMW Vision EfficientDynamics”, which would be a little odd if this was a camouflaged car out testing. Sort of gives the game away.

No, this BMW i8 – just like the BMW i3 the other day – is being filmed by BMW TV for a teaser VT on the new BMW i range of cars. And the snapper of these photos has snapped them whilst that VT was being shot.

Still, spy shots they are – if rather well-labeled spy shots – and they do show BMW are moving forward with the i8. An i8 which, incidentally, may now get a 4-pot petrol lump to go with its hybrid gubbins, instead of the 1.5 litre diesel lump it sported at Frankfurt 2009.

That is seen as a possible sop to the Americans, who don’t yet get that diesel is no longer the fuel of Satan. Whether that will still match the sub-5 second 0-60mph and 75mpg remains to be seen, but it seems likely, especially as the bulk power comes from the electric motors, not the ICE.

But whatever propels the i8, it isn’t going to be a frugal little 2-door BMW; a sort of eco Z2. No, this is going to be a halo car from BMW and far from cehap.

Think around £150k when it arrives in 2013.