Mahindra keenMahindra keen to lead E-vehicles race to lead E-vehicles race

Mahindra electric vehicle

India's Mahindra announced on Wednesday that it will be setting up a new facility to make battery packs to power e-vehicles. The plant will be located in Pune, Chakan (India) and will increase Mahindra's production of battery packs by 10 times more.

Mahindra is working on new technologies that will lead into production of high powered vehicles with a maximum speed of 200 km/ph and will travel in between 350-400 km on a single charge.

The company hopes to "lead the electric mobility revolution" in India according the senior executives.

We're taking a leap of faith as we expect a steep ramp up in demand in the coming year,"  said M&M managing director Pawan Goenka.

Currently, M&M imports battery cells and assembles 400-500 units per month in Bengaluru, against the dependence of electric car production.

The new facility will have a capacity of 60 000 units, approximately 5 000 per month.

P. Goenka said Mahindra will work towards bringing down manufacturing costs of electric vehicles by 20% in order to reach sustainable pricing. And Mahindra hopes the cost of imported battery cells to soon come down by two thirds.

Source ET: OA by Vatsala Gaur

India plans make all its cars electric by 2030

India's government announced plans to make all of its cars electric by 2030. "By that year, not a single petrol or diesel car should be sold in the country," said Piyush Goyal who is the power minister of India while speaking at a confederation of Indian Industry last month.

India currently imports $150 billion in oil making it the 3rd largest oil consumer among all the countries in world. The numbers of 'fuel' powered vehicles has been growing with its economy and is expected to continue rising. NITI Saying, India's 'think tank', said replacing fuel powered cars would save India $60 billion in energy by 2030-and reduce carbon emissions by 37%.

India hopes to pair an increase in electric car use with solar power, "the reason is likely due to deep connection being drawn between the future of EVs and the future of solar pwer, including using EV batteries as storage for solar energy, which helps with grid balancing".

The NITI Ayoong 15 year plan includes limits on the registration of gas cars, subsidies for the EV industry, and the use of taxes from gas car sales to create electric charging stations.

Source Quartz

China sells more electric vehicles than the US

352, 000 new electric vehicles (EVs) were registered in the year 2016, and only 159, 000 EVs were registered in the United States of America (50%+ in the state of California).

Analysts cautioned Chinese numbers in EVs sold could decrease due to subsidies, however estimates of the remaining (fair) much higher than the United States.
A consulting firm, Navigant, put Chinese sells at 250, 000, but predicted registrations would double in 2017.

Rebecca Lindland, a Kelly Blue Book analyst said, "It was inevitable that China's EV adoption was going to surpass the US's mostly because we're so resistant to EV's". According to Lindland many Chinese drivers' first cars will be electric and the younger generations may never own a gas powered vehicle.

China has now taken the lead in the EV industry and use. China reportedly wants 11% of all car sales to be electric by 2020-which will likely add up to nearly 3 million EVs yearly. "New Energy Vehicles," accounted for about 50% of all plug-in electric vehicles sold in 2016.

The US car market stood at around 17.5 million units yearly, while China sold over 28 million vehicles last year and increased its market share.

China has also been injecting capital in charging infrastructure and financial incentives.
Xinhua News reported the Chinese government will deploy 100, 000 EV charging stations in 2017, to bring a new total of 250, 000. The US has 41000 vehicle charging stations.

Electric vehicles- in China are exempted from the $6000-$ 10. 000 (per car) excise taxes, while giving special lane access and other perks, says the International Energy Agency.

And the US is planning reducing the EV tax break amounting up to ($ 7 500 in estimate, for buyers).

Other factors to consider; Tesla and Chevrolet are racing to release their mass-market EVs in 2018 that cost around $35 000, but China is manufacturing simpler versions at very low price, however the vehicles aren't classified as mass-market. The Chinese "low-speed electric vehicle" (LSEV) uses basic battery (usually lead- acid) and electric motor technologies.

The low-speed electric (LSEVs) have a top speed of about 40mph (70 km) and cost about $5000.

"The whole Shading province (population 90 million) is riding LSEVs" says Dennis Zuev a mobility researcher at Lancashire University.

"Even in big cities" he says.

LSEV cost around $5 000 and can travel up to 40mph and do not require a driver's license or license plates to operate.


Source: Quartz