For the better part of the last decade, Alabama has been turning itself into a place where electric cars are made.

Now the state just needs to become a place where more electric vehicles are driven.

The number of electric cars in Alabama is expected to balloon in the coming years, meaning new challenges, including installing charging stations, maintaining the power grid, and convincing consumers that their transportation needs can be met without gasoline.

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey says the bus is leaving the station and the bus is electric.

Delivering opening remarks at an electric vehicle summit in Birmingham today, Ivey told the crowd of a few hundred attendees that the future of transportation was electric, and that Alabama is being proactive in embracing the changing automotive markets.

“We need to lean in on this new technology for the sake of our economy tomorrow,” Ivey said.

Alabama has become “an industry giant” in electric vehicle manufacturing, according to Gov. Kay Ivey.

Ivey’s opening remarks Wednesday kick-started the inaugural Drive Electric Alabama EV Summit in Birmingham.

The summit featured discussions regarding state leadership’s efforts to attract EV automotive manufacturers to Alabama along other EV-related topics.

Panels of industry experts, elected officials and manufacturing executives touched on topics related to charging technology, EV charging’s effect on the power grid, among other key issues.

Autocar has delivered its first Alabama-built electric vehicle, a signal that the manufacturer of specialized trucks sees a future in EVs.

Autocar’s first battery-electric terminal tractor, the E-ACTT, went to Old Dominion Freight Line for use at its Rialto, California, facility.

Autocar produces specialized severe-duty vocational vehicles for a wide range of industrial applications. Its Alabama plant is the first to add EV production to the mix.