"With tractors being used in vineyards, berry fields and hobby farms, the EV industry hopes to prove out the promise of electrifying the $38 billion US agricultural vehicle industry."

"Robert Wallace was puzzled when the first electric tractor was delivered to his home in rural Dufur, Oregon, about 75 miles east of Portland.

Wallace, an expert on rural energy projects, knows his way around a tractor. But the electric machine, distributed by the California-based startup Solectrac, didn’t idle when he turned it on, unlike the loud diesel-powered tractors he was used to. It hummed.

“It was the first electric tractor I’d ever seen,” he said. “I wasn’t sure if it was running or not.”

Wallace has since become a guru of electric tractors, climate tech that’s just starting to show up on U.S. fields and farms."

Grant Stringer reports for Inside Climate News July 13, 2022. [2]