The streets of Shenzhen City in Guangdong Province are now a little bit cleaner after 40 battery electric taxis went into operation.
The vehicles are based on BYD’s e6 with Shenzhen the first city to put electric taxis in operation in China.
Chief executive of BYD, Wang Chuanfu, commented that the five passenger vehicle has a maximum speed of 87mph and consumes 21.5kWh per 100km. It can travel for about 300km on one charge.
A report in Xinhua states that the electric taxis will be operated by Pengcheng Electric Taxi Company and suggests BYD hopes to have around 100 e6 taxis on Shenzhen’s roads by the end of June. It is also expected to start selling the vehicles to the US later this year with plans to roll out the e6 in the European market in February, 2011.
BYD initially received government approval to produce the e6, which is powered by lithium iron phosphate batteries, back in January.
