THE VEHICLES
Chinese automobile manufacturer BYD is launching
the K12A, an 88.5-foot-long electric bus. The K12A has
a passenger capacity of 250 and a top speed of about 43
mph. According to BYD, the K12A is the world’s longest
battery-electric bus, and the first with a distributed 4WD
system that can switch between 2WD and 4WD.
The bus features DC and AC charging ports and a
range of over 185 miles per charge. Each K12A can save
the equivalent of 80 tons of carbon dioxide emissions
annually and 95,000 gallons of fuel over its lifetime,
according to BYD.
BYD has delivered more than 50,000 of its shorter
electric buses.
Luis Carlos Moreno, CEO of Colombia’s Express, said,
“I’m confident that BYD’s super-long pure electric buses
are the future of bus rapid transit systems. On a trip to
Shenzhen, I’ve seen that the city’s public buses are al-
ready 100% electrified, and I firmly believe that electrifi-
cation is a future global trend.”
Fiat Chrysler (FCA) has
reached a deal with Tesla
to count the California
carmaker’s EVs as part
of the FCA fleet in order
to avoid paying fines for
violating new European Union emissions rules. The Fi-
nancial Times reported that the deal is worth “hundreds
of millions of euros.”
More stringent emissions standards will take effect
next year in the EU, reducing the average emissions limit
to 95 grams of CO 2 per kilometer. Automakers whose ve-
hicles don’t meet the target (which will probably be all of
them, with the possible exception of Renault/Nissan) are
permitted to form “open pools” with other companies
to reduce their fleet-wide average figures. The arrange-
ment is similar to the system of trading ZEV credits used
in California. Tesla has made over $1 billion in the last
three years by selling excess emissions credits in the US.
“FCA is committed to reducing the emissions of all
our products,” said the company. “The purchase pool
provides flexibility to deliver products our customers
are willing to buy while managing compliance with the
lowest cost approach.”
FCA has long been at the rear of the pack in the elec-
trification race, and like all the legacy automakers, it’s
caught between European governments’ goal of reducing
emissions and European drivers’ growing appetite for
gas-guzzling SUVs. The company is obviously calculat-
ing that paying to “manage compliance” is cheaper than
bringing its own EVs to market (and as always, talking
about reducing emissions is free).
Electrek’s Fred Lambert noted that the deal is a well-
timed windfall for Tesla, which appears to be going
through a cash crunch, but that the extra income may
not last for more than a few years. To its credit, Fiat
Chrysler does have its own electrified vehicles in the
pipeline – last year the company announced plans to in-
vest 9 billion euros ($10.1 billion) in electrification over
four years.BYD launches the “world’s
longest” electric bus
Fiat Chrysler to pay Tesla
hundreds of millions for
European emissions credits
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Image courtesy of BYD