The Canadian manufacturer Lion Electric, known for its electric school buses, is now starting the expansion of its range of commercial electric vehicles with the launch of its first electric truck in the US vehicle category of Class 8.

++ Kindly find an update to this article below. ++

This class category corresponds to local trucks over 15 tons. The 350 kW strong Lion8 offers a battery capacity of up to 480 kWh for up to 400 km range, using NMC cells from LG Chem, claims Lion Electric. TM4, AddÉnergie Technologies and Solution Centum Adetel Transportation were also involved in the development of the electric truck.

The launch is set in the autumn of this year. Lion Electric has revealed that Société des Alcools du Québec (SAQ) is its first customer so stay close to home for now. Lion envisions the truck primarily working within cities, but claim that customers who order the most substantial battery package could potentially use Lion8 trucks on inter-city routes.

According to the manufacturing company founded in 2008, it has sold more than 150 electric school buses to date and also launched an electric minibus in May 2018 reportedly. They also announced they were working on a whole suite of electric commercial vehicles at its factory in Quebec at the time.

Now the electric truck is ready. The Canadian government supported the development of the commercial electric vehicle with 8.6 million Canadian dollars. Lion Electric has enabled pre-orders online.

Update 24.03.2019: Dana Incorporated announced that it was chosen as a preferred supplier for the Lion Electric Company for traditional and electrified components on its recently launched all-electric urban Class 8 vehicle, the Lion8. The truck features Dana’s TM4 direct drive system and traditional Spicer driveline components.

greencarcongress.com, freightwaves.com, thelionelectric.com (PDF), thelionelectric.com (pre-order),

Additional reporting by Nora Manthey.