Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL), under the administration of the Ministry of Power, government of India (GoI), is to procure 10,000 electric vehicles (EVs) from Tata Motors. The company has bagged the order following  an international competitive bidding. 

Autocar Professional learns the Tata car is most likely an electric Tigor sedan. Tata Motors will now supply the EVs in two phases – the first 500 electric cars will be supplied to EESL in November 2017 and remaining 9,500 units in the second phase. 

The tender floated by EESL is the world’s largest single electric vehicle procurement. Tata Motors, Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) and Nissan Motor Co participated in the tender and the bids for Tata Motors and M&M were opened. 

Tata Motors quoted the lowest price of Rs 10.16 lakh (exclusive of GST) in the competitive bidding. The vehicle will be provided to EESL for Rs 11.2 lakh (inclusive of GST) and with comprehensive 5-year warranty. This is claimed to be 25 percent below the current retail price of a similar electric car with 3-year warranty. 

Commenting on bagging the government order for EVs, Guenter Butschek, CEO and MD, Tata Motors said,“Tata Motors is extremely proud to partner with the government of India in its journey to facilitate faster adoption of electric vehicles and to build a sustainable India. Tata Motors has been collaboratively working to develop electric powertrain technology for its selected products. The EESL tender provided us the opportunity to participate in boosting e-mobility in the country, at the same time accelerate our efforts to offer full range of electric vehicles to the Indian consumers.”

Mahindra & Mahindra, which has the largest portfolio of commercially available EVs in the country, lost out on the tender due to a higher quote. Anand Mahindra, chairman of the Mahindra Group, though was magnanimous as he tweeted "Congratulations @TataMotors! A terrific price. Delighted the revolution in the EV market has begun. With more players,the market will expand."

EESL to identify service providers
Along with procurement of 10,000 EVs, EESL will also identify a service provider agency. This agency, also appointed through competitive bidding, will carry out end-to-end fleet management of the procured vehicles for the concerned government customer.

Apart from continuing to aggregate demand, EESL will also be responsible such as co-ordination between appointed agencies, monitoring and supervision, reporting, complaint redressal and payments. These cars will be used to replace the petrol and diesel cars used by the government and its agencies over a 3-4 year period. The total number of vehicles used by the government and its agencies in the country is estimated to be 500,000. 

As is known, government think-tank NITI Aayog had published a white paper in May 2017 which suggests a future roadmap for the country. It proposes how shared passenger mobility, electric vehicles and connected cars can cut its energy demand by 64% and carbon emissions by 37% in 2030.

This would result in a reduction of 156 Mtoe in diesel and petrol consumption for that year and at US$ 52/bbl of crude, this would imply a net savings of roughly Rs 390,000 crore in 2030. 

EV-olution of Tata Motors
Tata Motors preparations for its EV journey began over three years ago. In May 2014, Tata Motors European Technical Centre (TMETC), based at the University of Warwick in Coventry, UK, had revealed a Manza REEV (range extended electric vehicle) demonstrator vehicle. The sedan incorporated a lot of the learnings from TMETC’s in-house research into high-voltage distribution systems, battery design and vehicle controller development.

A couple of months later, Autocar Professional learnt that Tata Motors was also working on a part-electric Nano called the Nano ‘e-rev’ which would help extend the Nano’s driving range as well as add the green quotient to the small car.

Earlier this month, TMETC had revealed a fully electric concept of its Tiago hatchback at the LCV2017 (an exhibition for low carbon emissions vehicles) in Millbrook, UK. Using a liquid-cooled 85kW electric drive motor that develops 200Nm of torque, Tata claims that the Tiago EV has a range of over 100km, a top speed of 135kph and a 0-100kph time of sub-11sec. Also, with a kerb weight of 1,040kg, it is around 20kg lighter than the heaviest variant of the Tiago that is currently on sale in India.

Also read:
Interview with Guenter Butschek: 'Applying electric drivetrain to our legacy products is not too much of a challenge any more.'