Silence on the ice: an electric explorer takes over glacier tours in Canada

Pursuit has put the first electric Ice Explorer into service on the Columbia Icefield. It is quieter than the diesel, manages its own speed and cuts emissions.

Canada has a new and unusual electric vehicle — not for the city, the highway or off-road trails, but for a glacier. Pursuit has launched the first electric Ice Explorer in Jasper National Park: these machines carry tourists across the Columbia Icefield to the Athabasca Glacier.

The electric Ice Explorer was developed together with Noble Northern of Manitoba — a company that specialises in heavy-duty electric conversions. The vehicle was built to travel over glacial terrain: it has a frame more than 50% lighter, bifacial solar panels, regenerative braking and dedicated safety systems for the ice. There are even geofences — the electronics manage speed on their own and apply the brakes on certain stretches of the route.

The main difference for passengers is the quiet. In an ordinary diesel Ice Explorer the ride comes with the heavy drone of the engine, while the electric version lets you hear the glacier itself and the surroundings better. For a tourist route that is no small thing: what they sell here is not speed but the experience of a place an ordinary bus simply cannot reach.

By Pursuit's estimates, the electric Ice Explorer can cut emissions by 200–300 kg of CO2 per day compared with a diesel vehicle on the same route. For now this is a pilot project: the electric all-terrain vehicle will run within the regular fleet on a set rotation through the season, and the company will see whether such machines can be scaled up on glacier routes.

The most intriguing thing about the project is not the electrification itself, but the place. For once an electric vehicle looks not like a fashionable replacement for a petrol car, but like a tool that works more quietly and gently exactly where extra noise and exhaust stand out the most.