Honda to Begin Selling Mini-Commercial Electric Vans in Spring 2024

Gearing up to electrify its range of vehicles, Honda Motor Co announced on Wednesday that it would begin selling electric vans in small sizes during the spring season of 2024.

Japanese automakers are turning to small commercial trucks as one way to make battery electric vehicles (BEVs) popular in the country, tapping into car size unique to the country amid pressure to slash its carbon footprint.

Honda's electric van is designed to reach a cruising range of 200km (125 miles), and the company aims for its price tag to be around 1 million yen ($7,270). Despite this, gasoline-electric hybrid models have remained far more popular in Japan, with BEVs only attributing for about 1% of total passenger cars sold last year.

Automakers recognize that small commercial vehicles are crucial to the widespread adoption of BEVs in Japan, considering 40% of cars on the roads are "kei" microcars and businesses increasingly feel compelled by investors to lessen their carbon footprints. Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe echoed this sentiment when he stated back at April: “We believe that accelerating electric vehicle usage in Japan starts with capturing the commercial market, particularly for lighter vehicles which make up a large part of our country’s auto sector."

Last month, Mitsubishi Motors Corp stunned the industry with a re-launch of their electric commercial truck; Minicab-MiEV. It has an amazing cruising range of 133km and is priced at approximately 2.4 million yen without subsidies. As it turns out, CJPT (a coalition led by Toyota Motor) within July intended to build small electrical vans alongside Daihatsu and Suzuki Motor Corps too! Honda in April also declared its ambition to create two million EVs annually along with thirty EV models globally by 2030 – electrifying news for everyone indeed!