photo 1

Shown here is GM Defense’s hybrid-electric next generation light tactical wheeled vehicle at IDEX 2023. The company plans to use this concept vehicle as an entry point for the Army’s eLRV prototyping competition. (Ashley Roque/Breaking Defense)

Columbus, Ohio — Army leaders have approved the requirements to buy Electric Light Reconnaissance Vehicle prototypes next year, but despite their name, those vehicles may not be fully electric at all, according to a senior service official.

The Army has been eyeing ways to field EVs to soldiers for several years and even tested out potential eLRV candidates. While challenges remain for acquiring such vehicles, the service is now ready to move forward with the eLRV prototyping competition and the forthcoming fiscal 2024 budget request includes funds to pay for the program, according to Deputy Assistant Secretary for Sustainment Timothy Goddette.

There is money for prototyping and working the early stages of the program, the requirement was approved,” he told reporters at a National Defense Industrial Association conference. 

“I don’t think the requirements says it has to be pure electric…it says a range from hybrid through electric, depending on where the technology is,” Goddette added. If lawmakers approve that funding and the project stays on track, the Army expects to begin receiving eLAV prototypes in 2025, and then, based on testing with those vehicles, decide how to proceed.

RELATED: Army electric vehicle goals ‘pretty darn achievable,’ but challenges remain

Additional details about this upcoming competition will likely emerge once the service issues a solicitation to industry and companies offer up their prospective vehicles.

Meanwhile, Goddette said the Army plans to leverage findings from initiatives like eLAV and other efforts such as the hybrid-electric Joint Light Tactical Vehicle to influence its path ahead for larger vehicles.

On the tactical wheeled vehicle side, it’s probably unlikely that we’re going to have EVs until 2050 and that’s not just because the technology is not ready, we also have the reality of how long it takes to turn the fleet over,” he added. 

For such larger vehicles, he added that it simply does not make sense to have a 5-ton electric truck weighed down with 4.5 tons of batteries because that “doesn’t leave a lot of room for cargo.” The other part of the equation revolves around recharging these batteries in austere environments. Both parts, he said, are going to take more time to sort through, leaving the shift toward hybrid-electric more realistic near term. 

“Even if you have an electric vehicle, you still have to ask the question under the concept of the operation… Where do batteries have to go so that I can now have that right balance? And how am I going to recharge an electric vehicle in the places that we’re going to be?” Goddette said.