Big announcement from one of the largest motorsports manufacturers in the world – Kawasaki shared its plans recently to go all-electric in less than 20 years.
Kawasaki is the third Japanese motorcycle manufacturer that shows signs of accepting the fact that electric transportation would have a big part of our future – Honda claims zero-emission target by 2040, Yamaha plans to get there by the year 2050 – as part of “Yamaha Motor Group Environmental Plan 2050“.
KTM, Honda, Yamaha & Piaggio, also signed an agreement to join forces to create standardized battery and charger systems for electric motorcycles and lightweight electric vehicles (like scooters and mopeds)
Kawasaki plans to go all-electric by 2035 but not everywhere in the world – this plan is only valid for Japan, North America, Canada, Europe, and Australia. This means that big markets like China, India, Brazil ETC, would not be affected by this move.
Watch the EV Endeavor, an electric motorcycle prototype made by Kawasaki, in some track action
Kawasaki also says they will reveal at least 10 new electric & hybrid motorcycles models by the end of 2025 (that’s in less than 5 years, yes?) and we also know they have been playing around with hydrogen technology – as we can learn from this
Accepting electric motorcycles would be hard for riders, and Kawasaki knows that –
“For motorcycle users, the experience of engine sound and the vibration is very important. We want to keep the fun of such motorcycles and respond to the carbon-neutral era,” Kawasaki Heavy Industries president Yasuhiko Hashimoto said in a statement.
Kawasaki plans the electrification of both road and off-road motorcycles – but this company makes much more of that – Jet skies, SBS, ATV’s… could this be just the start?
Why does Kawasaki plan to go all-electric?
With more and more automakers around the world planning electrification, basically saying that the internal combustion engines will die soon, and with states like California saying it will ban non-electric new cars and truck sales by 2035, big companies like Kawasaki can’t just sit still and wait for the storm to pass – cause it’s probably not gonna!
If the big motorcycle companies do not react soon, they will have a big problem.
And as much as we love shifting gears and engine sound – we have to admit that electric transportation is coming. Look at it this way – wouldn’t an electric H2 be cool (and fast) as hell?
