The Lion Electric Company plans to start manufacturing a new line of all-electric trucks next year, specifically targeting medium- to heavy-duty urban vehicles, including service and delivery trucks, cranes and ambulances.
In advance of that development, Lion Electric recently revealed its new all-electric, 26-foot midi/minibus, the eLionM, a low-floor vehicle built to meet paratransit, transit and urban requirements capable of traveling 150 miles on a single charge.
“The launch of this new vehicle represents a major achievement for Lion, our society and our environment,” said Marc Bedard, founder and CEO at Lion. “The eLionM will serve so many purposes that we already nicknamed it our ‘Swiss Army Knife.’ This 160-kWh vehicle is one of a kind and is not a retrofit.
“It’s a custom-built, zero-emission and energy efficient solution specifically built with transportation operators and agencies in mind.”
Peter Rego, Lion’s chief commercial officer in the United States, said the company already is taking pre-orders.
“(We) are excited to continue to demonstrate our commitment to cleaner air, a healthy population and a greener planet with this new vehicle,” Rego said. “We just completed the biggest deployment of all-electric school buses in the USA and it’s clearly just the beginning.”
Lion also is the only integrated OEM that makes its own chassis, battery packs and body in this category. This allows them to use the best components and technologies (battery swap and different charging options), and control the overall cost of their products.
Lion spent the last 8 years designing and developing all-electric vehicles and the last 3 commercializing the eLionC, an all-electric Type C school bus. The company already deployed more than 150 eLionCs, with more than a million miles driven. Lion has the biggest fleet of all-electric Type C school buses in North America.
In addition to distributing the eLionC and eLionM, Lion will also introduce the eLionA this summer, an electric minibus designed to meet school transportation requirements.