The Nohm Electric Bus Aims To Tackle Emissions Head On (CleanTechnica Exclusive)
The Advance Clean Transportation Expo in Long Beach this year may have been dominated by natural gas (NG) and liquefied natural gas (LNG) when it came to display space, but the real shining stars at the convention center were electric. One such star was Nohm electric — a company focused on bringing mid-size electric vehicles to consumers in the US.
The brand Nohm might not ring a bell, but the company comes from the solid rootstock of Smith Electric Vehicles, backed by funding from China’s Five Dragons Group (FDG) Electric Vehicles.
This powerful combination of brands and funding have been rolled together into a single joint venture packaged under the Nohm brand, which will be the exclusive US distributor of both Smith and FDG EVs.
These connections allow Nohm — which was only founded in 2015 — to offer a full range of mid-size electric vehicles to customers in the US:
At ACT in Long Beach, Nohm unveiled its mid-sized bus offering and rolled out the red carpet in the form of sponsoring a social hour that spanned the entire expo floor.
Ironically, the open bars started flowing as I began wandering the floor one last time, so I grabbed my pineapple juice and resumed my search for friendly exhibitors.
Coincidentally, it was then that I made it over to the Nohm exhibit and probed for details with Founder Jared D. Lock, Ph.D. He shared the depth of the Nohm partnerships and a bit about the bold vision that inspired the creation of Nohm.
As it proclaims on its homepage, Nohm’s mission is to eradicate resistance to the electrical vehicle movement:
Much like BYD, Nohm has its sights set on eliminating the emissions stemming from trucks and bus traffic in our urban center. This is critical because cities are hubs for not only the highest concentrations of people but also the highest concentrations of dirty, particulate-generating, diesel-burning trucks and buses.
Nohm aims to cut into this market and is boldly moving forward against its goals to attack this. Specifically, FDG recently announced the opening of a new 2.8-million-square-foot factory that will be able to produce up to 100,000 battery-powered buses per year for the Chinese and US markets.
Initially, Nohm will be importing mostly assembled buses from China and completing the assembly in the US, but the company plans to begin full assembly of the vehicles in the US starting around 2018.
Nohm feels like a rebranding of a few old-hat EV brands that are looking to tap into the “cool factor” of Silicon Valley and ride the wave of electrification that is surging through California. Having said that, Nohm seems to have all the right pieces of the puzzle to take a solid crack at solving the mid-size truck & bus challenge in cities around the world.
The new mid-sized bus that Nohm had on display at ACT features a 76 kilowatt-hour battery, which allows for about 100 miles per charge. A larger 96 kilowatt-hour battery will also be offered to support longer-range travel. In-hub motors also decrease the mechanical complexity of the units.
Wander over to the Nohm website for some background on the company … though, details on the vehicles are not yet available online.
Images credit: Kyle Field
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