“We know how to get big power at a location.”Īll of North America’s top producers of heavy- and medium-duty diesel powered commercial trucks have launched battery-electric models, as have several newer players in the market such as Nikola and Tesla. Electricity increasingly is coming from greener sources such as wind and solar. The technology is available and established. “It’s the utility doing work outside of your property to be able to get you that much power.”īut Roeth said the industry will advance one step at a time. “One of the things we’re really learning is 50 trucks is a small town from an electricity demand standpoint, so it’s just not plugging them into the wall,” Roeth said. Challenges exist with the charging infrastructure and financing. In 10-15 years, shorthaul inner city trucks will be largely electric, he said, but the longhaul sector has special challenges so it will be a while before it’s ready. The vehicles are more expensive, but the battery packs aren’t so large that weight and cost become problems. Mike Roeth, executive director at the North American Council for Freight Efficiency, said battery-electric propulsion currently makes the most sense for smaller, urban vehicles, such as delivery vans and medium-duty box trucks. “It’s not a case of, well, it’s not going to happen until X years down the road. The latter actually are not ideal applications for diesel and gas engines because of the many stops and starts. Rundle of ACT Research said electric trucks are not at price parity with diesels but can have a positive total cost of ownership comparison.Īdoption is occurring in certain segments, such as yard spotters, which operate at slow speeds in depots with a lot of stop-and-start battery regeneration and an environment ripe for “opportunity charging” where the truck is stopped long enough for a partial recharge.Įlectric trucks make sense in other market segments such as refuse and parcel delivery. “The thing that we need to keep in mind is we have about, what, 130 years of invention and innovation in the diesel engine behind us, and we have been starting to take electrification seriously in say, 2015,” he said. Nonetheless, Aulbur is still bullish on electric trucks. Data capabilities will need to be enhanced to plan routes. In addition to the costs of the trucks, fleets will need huge amounts of electricity and potentially a new substation, more depot space for charging stations, and either more people or autonomous solutions for nighttime charging. The pricing and operational challenges of switching to electric trucks are massive, Aulbur said. Still, the number of medium- and heavy-duty electric vehicles on the road today remains small and manufacturers are still scaling up production. “And industry knows that they have to make the move.” “I really do believe that the public money that’s on the table is basically telling industry, ‘Listen, you have to make the move,’ ” he said. It also helps the United States control raw materials and remain strategically independent. The IRA gives manufacturers a 10-year window of security for investments. population, have passed or are considering rules similar to California’s phased-in sales mandate for zero-tailpipe-emission trucks.Īulbur said the United States is ahead of Europe but trails China in electric vehicle development. Meanwhile, 13 states and the District of Columbia, representing more than 40% of the U.S. The base price of a Class 8 battery-electric truck is between $350,000 to $500,000, or three to five times that of a diesel. Those incentives will partially cover the big price difference between diesels and electrics. Of that, $24 billion would come from the IRA and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021. Now he believes that transformation could happen faster with advancing technology and with incentives offered by the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which provides up to $40,000 per truck plus significant incentives for locally produced batteries.Īccording to the State of Sustainable Fleets 2023 Market Brief by transportation and energy consulting firm Gladstein, Neandross & Associates, clean fleet incentives will average $32 billion annually the next four or five years. He had thought the heavy-duty market would reach 5% to 15% in that same time frame. (Seth Clevenger/Transport Topics)Īulbur earlier had thought the take rate for medium-duty zero-tailpipe-emission vehicles, composed largely of electric vehicles, could increase significantly in 2025 and reach 30% to 40% by 2030. Mack’s new MD Electric model on display at an industry show.
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