The North East Development Commission (NEDC) is to introduce electric vehicles in Northeast Nigeria in line with President Bola Tinubu’s directive to promote cleaner energy.
Managing Director of NEDC, Mohammed Alkali, who disclosed this to journalists on Wednesday at the State House, Abuja, after meeting with President Tinubu, said the commission conducted a thorough analysis of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) and electric vehicles (e-vehicles) and concluded that e-vehicles are better suited for the region.
This decision, according to Alkali, was informed by plans to create modular solar power units across states, providing a standby power source for the e-vehicles.
He said the e-vehicle fleet will comprise three categories: e-buses designed for intra-state movements with a minimum capacity of 40 people per trip, e-taxis capable of carrying three people including the driver, and modified tricycles enhanced to carry eight people including the driver.
The commission, he further explained, prioritized local content, ensuring that vehicle bodies can be fabricated locally in the North East or other regions.
According to him: “We are here today to brief Mr President on one very critical activities he has approved which we had to engage in the last two months.
“As you can recall, there’s a directive from the President that cars as soon as possible should use CNG or electric vehicles, and we at the northeast development commission did a thorough analysis of our region, because we cover six states in Northeast Region, and look at the comparable advantage between CNG and e-vehicles.
“After our thorough analysis, we came to the conclusion that for the Northeast region, yes, the CNG could work, but e-vehicle can work better for many reasons.
“One is that our plan at end of day is to create modular solar power units across the state which can be used to power this percentage of e-vehicles.
“On that note, earlier on, we sought and got approval of the Presidency for us to go ahead and come up with the framework of how we are going to deploy this e-mobility in the northeast and what kind of e-mobility, etc, and Mr. President graciously gave approval, and today we came to present to him the kind of e-vehicles we are going to introduce in the Northeast.
“There are three categories. One is the E-busses, which can carry about 40 people or passengers at a given point in time, at the minimum, and that’s it for intrastate, not interstate. And also we brought some sample of e-taxis which normally will carry three people passengers as well as the driver, and we also brought in a highly modified tricycle.
“Most of the tricycle we have in the North East or elsewhere only carry three people plus the driver four, but in our case, we have modified it to carry eight people plus the driver, and it’s fully covered and very convenient, and we are also, knowing the kind of weight and people we are going to carry, we’ve asked our engineers to modify the physical structure of the the tricycle. when you look at it, you can see the tires are bigger, the prime are bigger, and so and so forth.
“Also, in doing that, we also consider local content that the body can be fabricated locally in the North East or somewhere else in the region.
“So today we made a presentation to the President. And delightfully, the chairman is here and Mr. President approved that we should go ahead and deploy the e-mobility in the northeast in region”.
President Tinubu had approved the deployment of e-mobility in the Northeast, paving the way for a cleaner, more efficient transportation system.
Speaking on the potential of the Northeast, Alkali said the commission has developed comprehensive master plans that covers 11pillars that will fully activate action plan for the initiative.
The NEDC boss further stated that the Commission will engage stakeholders, specially the road transport workers thereby integrating their concerns and advises before the final stage of activating the e-vehicles across the Northeast states of Nigeria.
“We will engage stakeholders especially road transport workers to integrate their concerns and advises”, he added.