AMP Electric Vehicles, a company offering emission-free electrification of OEM vehicles, AMP handed over the keys of an electric Mercedes-Benz ML 350 to the company’s newest and biggest client, Gisli Gislason, the chairman and chief executive of Northern Lights Energy, a utility in Iceland.
This is the initial delivery committed in AMP’s long term supply agreement with the Icelandic company signed on April, 14, 2011. The Mercedes SUV was just the first vehicle produced in accordance with the five-year contract between the two companies, during which Amp expects to ship 1,000 E.V.’s to the island nation.
In the past, Amp has converted only General Motors passenger cars, primarily the Chevrolet Equinox crossover.. The Mercedes-Benz ML’s proportions are similar to those of the Equinox, which helped in the conversion, particularly to house the company’s 900-pound battery unit.
“We retained a split battery pack to keep the weight balance about equal to the original manufacturer’s specification,” said Steve Burns, president and co-founder of Amp, in a telephone interview. “We can even lower the center of gravity a bit to give it better handling.”
The ML’s global distribution was also a consideration for Amp. “It’s a world car, so it’s already passed Euro and U.S. crash-safety tests,” he said. “That’s the benefit of our approach; we didn’t have to worry about developing a defroster or a windshield wiper.”
Amp is not committing exclusively to the ML as its future platform, nor is it trying to lock up a contract with one battery supplier (Mr. Burns declined to name the current supplier of its batteries). This is an advantage of the company’s business model, Mr. Burns said. “We have a five-year contract, so you can imagine what batteries will do during that time,” he said. “We try to be battery agnostic.”
Mr. Burns estimates that the ML should travel 100 miles on a charge in pure highway driving, which compares favorably to the estimated range of the Nissan Leaf, despite the ML weighing nearly 2,000 pounds more than the purely electric Nissan.
Though primarily an electricity provider, Northern Lights will function as a distribution channel for the Amp vehicles. Mr. Gislason is working to secure orders from companies, municipalities and individual buyers in Iceland, who, according to Mr. Gislason, should be easy quarry.
“Gasoline is about $8 a gallon right now, and Iceland has low import taxes on E.V.’s,” he said in a telephone interview. “A Mercedes S.U.V. would be basically the same price to import, plus you’d have to purchase gas. For us, it’s a no brainer.”
Iceland also generates much of its electricity through geothermal and hydroelectric sources, which increases the cost benefit of E.V. operation, he said.
The utility’s agreement with Amp is not exclusive, so Northern Lights could conceivably become partners with other E.V. manufacturers. However, Mr. Gislason does not expect that to occur soon. “Amp can deliver us cars. Today, they gave us a real car. We’re not being told by a big manufacturer, ‘Oh, there’s a delay.’ We’re getting them right now.”
