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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
Electric buses soon to be tested here
Province commits $1M to development of vehicles
Manitoba’s innovation minister, Dave Chomiak, with a Mitsubishi electric car. The province is partnering with Mitsubishi to develop an all-electric bus. (JOE BRYKSA / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS ARCHIVES)
Simply put, it's the big enchilada.
That's exactly how Innovation, Energy and Mines Minister Minister Dave Chomiak described the province's evolving partnership with Japanese conglomerate Mitsubishi in developing an all-electric bus and testing the company's new i-MiEV full-electric vehicle.
"They picked Manitoba," Chomiak said Tuesday, shortly after Premier Greg Selinger said his government would spend $1 million over the next three years toward building an electric bus with Mitsubishi, New Flyer Industries and Manitoba Hydro. The province will also spend $100,000 on the new electric vehicle centre at Red River College.
"Mitsubishi is into every single line of power and manufacturing," Chomiak said. "They needed a well-tuned company to deal with them on the bus. They chose Winnipeg where New Flyer is."
Chomiak said the goal is to have the electric bus developed in about a year so it can be road-tested in Manitoba's climate over the following two years. The next step would be mass-producing the electric bus for sale in North America and overseas.
"If the bus is successful, we will be able to sell many buses to the U.S. market," Ichiro Fukue, senior vice-president of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, said at an event at Red River College.
The development of an electric bus is part of Manitoba's push to electrify streets and highways under its Electric Vehicle Road Map. The new policy is aimed at not only getting more Manitobans to park their gas-guzzling vehicles, but to test and then capitalize on new electric-vehicle technology, such as the best way to recharge batteries. Unlike other places, the province has an estimated 500,000 plug-in points at homes, businesses and parking lots to charge up electric vehicles.
The province also wants to see 4,000 electric vehicles on the road by 2015, and has created an advisory committee to recommend ways how that can happen. One idea already under consideration is a new incentive program to reward drivers to retire their gas-guzzlers.
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition April 27, 2011 B1
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