The humble school bus has always been something of an environmental warrior – after all, if it didn’t exist to pick up around 50 or more children every day, there could be just as many cars as there are children on the road battling through the school run and heaping harmful emissions into the air. However now, school buses in China may become significantly greener.
That’s because Smith Electric Vehicles has agreed a deal with Wanxiang Group to develop, manufacture and commercialise all-electric school buses, and commercial vehicles, in China.
The terms include $25million in equity investment in Smith by Wanxiang – and add up to a $75million joint venture. The vehicles will be pushed under the Smith brand and will combine Wanxiang’s electric vehicle component technologies with Smith’s proprietary platform vehicle designs.
This will include the Smith Drive system, which features a configurable drive controller with integrated inverters to manage the auxiliary systems; as well as Smith Power, a proprietary battery system that uses battery cells of a variety of sizes from a number of different manufacturers. At the moment Smith works withValence and A123Systems and configures the battery size based on the vehicle model and route requirements to ensure maximum return on investment.
Among its existing vehicles are the Smith Newton and the Smith Edison.
