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from the I-wonder-who-delivers-the-parts? dept.
UPS will work with partner Workhorse, a battery-electric transportation technology company, to develop and deploy a fleet of 50 custom-built plug-in electric delivery trucks with zero emissions.
The goal is to make trucks that cost as much to buy as do traditional fuel-based delivery vehicles — even without taking into account subsidies. The Workhorse-designed vehicles will be all-electric, and are designed to run on a single charge throughout a normal delivery day and then charge back up overnight.
Workhorse says they'll have a 100-mile range, which is a good fit for in-city routes, and the trucks will first enter testing in urban areas in various parts of the U.S., including Atlanta, Dallas and LA. The test will lead to fine-tuning, which will lead to a larger fleet deployment targeting 2019.
Source: TechCrunch
Also at The Verge, Reuters and Cincinnati.com
(Score: 2) by frojack on Sunday February 25 2018, @07:48PM (7 children)
These trucks are going to have to have their load delivered to them in the field by other trucks.
There is no way they could start at the UPS Distribrution hub, then run out to their route, and do the entire rout,e and run back again ALL under 100 miles.
Open Google maps, search for UPS Distribution Center, ask it to show a route to your location. For me that is 71 miles ONE WAY (ymmv).
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by toddestan on Sunday February 25 2018, @08:05PM (2 children)
The UPS distribution centers I know about aren't in the middle of nowhere. Since they are talking about a limited deployment, I would imagine they are going to start with the routes that don't go far from the distribution center. Since the one I'm most familiar with is in a light industrial/office park area, with a residential neighborhood across the street from one side of it, the idea seems very doable.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Sunday February 25 2018, @10:37PM (1 child)
How far it it from the city center? Or from you for that matter?
That you can find a residential area near one, hardly justifies an entire development effort for a new truck.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by toddestan on Tuesday February 27 2018, @03:01AM
It's about 15 miles from the city center, give or take a few miles. It's also about 15 miles from me (I don't live in the city center, but another 'burb). So that's enough range to drive to the city, drive around some, and get back. That's assuming they even have to drive a route. The place I work for does enough shipping that FedEx will bring a truck 100% full of shipments only to us, drop them all off, fill the truck 100% with shipments from us, and go back to wherever they came from (I don't actually know where FedEx's distribution center is). If we switched to UPS they could do the same thing, and that's only about 30 miles - will within range.
I would guess that UPS knows what they are doing. They have a lot of trucks, and even if they can only replace 10-20% of them, it may very well be worth it if the savings are enough. Keep in mind UPS already designs their own trucks. And this effort is really just the first generation - they'll take what they learn and build a second, third, etc. generation that will be able to replace more of their fleet. It may be a very long time before 100% of UPS's trucks could be electric, but it wouldn't surprise me terribly if in 15-20 years if most of them were electric.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 25 2018, @08:28PM
Then they will not use it to deliver to you. 50 trucks? That is a small trial run for a company the size of UPS.
Using your same thought experiment. Take that same distribution center how many businesses and homes are in say a 25 mill radius of that hub? That is that much less fuel they need to buy.
From my location there are 4 hubs within 30 miles of my house (I am in the middle of them). That covers about 3 million people.
100 does seem quite low. They should make the battery pack larger. A day truck LTL runner will probably hit somewhere between 250-500 miles in one day. For UPS I would suspect the delivery trucks have a much lower mileage as the drivers also have to stop frequently and load/unload.
This is along the lines of 'what if we'. Companies this size run trials like this all the time. I would be very very surprised if this is their first time running electric trucks. It is more along the lines of what is the logistics of electricity. What happens if they break down. etc etc etc.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 26 2018, @02:40AM
14 miles one way from UPS distribution center to my house in an outer ring suburb (medium sized metro area).
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday February 26 2018, @03:26AM (1 child)
Not everyone lives in suburban/rural areas.
Here are a few examples:
Millions live and work within a 50 mile radius of this UPS distribution center [google.com]
At least a million people live/work within a 50 mile radius of this UPS distribution center [google.com].
At least 5% of the US population lives or works within 50 miles of this UPS distribution center [google.com].
What's more, those are not the only UPS distribution hubs in those areas. As such, a vehicle with a 100 mile range seems perfectly reasonable for those areas, IMHO.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 26 2018, @04:22AM
Obviously, UPS doesn't know where their vehicles go. No, sir. The company that saves in all kind of ways from planning their routes has no idea at all about when the trucks will run out of electricity.
Soylentils don't read the article, not even the summary saying "the trucks will first enter testing in urban areas in various parts of the U.S., including Atlanta, Dallas and LA." UPS must know where the trucks already fit and probably already know how much savings to expect. They just want to confirm them.
But no, Soylentils know UPS is going to use them for long routes and fail.