{"id":15365,"date":"2021-11-03T13:43:11","date_gmt":"2021-11-03T13:43:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.innovationnewsnetwork.com\/?p=15365"},"modified":"2021-11-03T13:43:11","modified_gmt":"2021-11-03T13:43:11","slug":"the-day-electric-commercial-vehicle-dawning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.innovationnewsnetwork.com\/the-day-electric-commercial-vehicle-dawning\/15365\/","title":{"rendered":"The day of the electric commercial vehicle is dawning"},"content":{"rendered":"
Commercial vehicles are a major contributor to air pollution and greenhouse gases \u2013 electric zero-emission buses and lorries are a major piece of the solution.<\/h2>\n
The electrification of passenger cars is hardly news anymore. The list of vendors, from Nissan to Tesla, BMW, and Ford, continues to grow as the technology matures, demand rises, and costs fall. Not only do market forces encourage adoption, but governments across the globe are urging, or even mandating, the transition to zero-emission vehicles. Several major manufacturers, such as Volkswagen and Volvo, have already set a course which leaves the internal combustion engine behind.<\/p>\n
A less-reported matter is the growing industry for zero-emission commercial vehicles, and yet, in many localities, commercial vehicles are a major source of automotive pollution. Medium- and heavy-duty lorries and buses are frequently diesel-powered which, despite decades of regulation-driven emissions improvements, are still a major source of air quality pollutants. And, of course, any vehicle that burns fossil fuels is contributing to the atmospheric carbon dioxide burden and, consequently, to climate change.<\/p>\n
Thus, the day of the electric commercial vehicle is dawning.<\/p>\n
Commercial electric vehicles (CEVs) are later to the market than passenger vehicles for several reasons:<\/p>\n
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The vehicles are inherently heavier, which means larger-capacity batteries are needed to deliver useful combinations of range and payload capacity. This drives up cost;<\/li>\n
Volumes are lower than for passenger vehicles, so it is taking longer for manufacturers and their suppliers to realise economies of scale; and<\/li>\n
The commercial vehicle market is highly nuanced, with many variations on any given vehicle platform and as many use-cases. Think of dust-carts, ambulances, airport shuttles, school buses, plumbers\u2019 vans, refrigerated food lorries, drays and council works lorries. It can be a technical challenge for a vehicle manufacturer to develop electric technology that supports this myriad of applications.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Nevertheless, the technology is now mature, and several manufacturers are poised to make CEVs in volume \u2013 with Lightning eMotors ahead of many.<\/p>\n
Lightning eMotors \n<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Lightning eMotors, a commercial vehicle manufacturer based in Loveland, Colorado, is addressing these markets with a range of electric vans, lorries, and buses which fulfil many of these nuanced use-cases, as well as widely deployed generic vehicles. The company employs an efficient and rapid path to market which involves taking existing commercial vehicles from large manufacturers such as Ford, GM, and Isuzu straight from the factories or dealers, and electrifying them in their facility in Colorado at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. This results in vehicles for which there is already a strong ecosystem of upfitters for cargo boxes, shelving, wheelchair lifts, cargo lifts, refrigeration units, and more. In almost all cases, the vehicles are road-ready electric vehicles before they are registered for the first time, meaning that they can qualify for government incentives for new EVs.<\/p>\n
At this time, Lightning has more operational electric commercial vehicles on the roads than any competing North American manufacturer, which is a testament to their efficient go-to-market strategy.<\/p>\n
The electric power train is Lightning\u2019s core intellectual property, and is engineered with many advanced features for efficiency, drivability, and safety. A new, additional line in Lightning\u2019s business model is producing power trains for third parties who will install them into vehicles in their own facilities. The recently-announced partnership with Ricardo in the United Kingdom is an example of this, allowing Lightning to extend its geographic reach while contributing to clean air and CO2<\/sub> reductions in the UK.<\/p>\n