The Volvo EC230 Electric excavator has been working in China since 2021 and Norway for a year but is now being made more widely available to selected customers across Europe.
The 23-tonne EC230 Electric is powered by lithium-ion batteries and has been designed to carry out a full eight hours of work, with a one-hour lunch break for a quick re-charge.
According to Volvo CE, operator feedback confirms that it has been achieving a similar digging force as its diesel equivalent, the Volvo EC200E, but doing so with an even faster cycle time and much less noise.
This is the first of Volvo CE’s excavators in the mid-size range to be made electric and has recently been joined by the 20-ton L120H Electric Conversion wheeled loader. Both machines follow the commercialisation of Volvo’s electric compact machines, the ECR25 Electric excavator and L25 Electric wheeled loader. Since then, the ECR18 Electric and EC18 Electric compact excavators and the L20 Electric wheel loader have also been introduced to the market.
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