March 6, 2019 Vol. 16 No. 5

There’s no doubt that a great many medium-duty truck operators could benefit from going the electric drivetrain route. Lower operating costs, pretty small maintenance outlays, smooth and quiet running to please drivers… the upsides are pretty significant if the application suits an electric truck. Many do, usually those involving short local runs and a return-to-base-every-night regime. Higher purchase cost might even be totally or largely offset by fuel and other savings, especially if there are subsidies to help up front.

Motiv Power customers have found its battery-electric vehicles (BEVs) to deliver tangible benefits, according to Jim Castelaz, founder and chief technology officer of Motiv Power Systems. Speaking about electrification at the Green Truck Summit in Indianapolis yesterday, he singled out one solid success story: AmeriPride has deployed nearly 30 Motiv Power BEVs and is experiencing 95% uptime, an 85% reduction in operating costs, a 66% savings in maintenance, and 100% driver satisfaction. It has racked up 100,000 miles on its electric truck fleet.

The biggest challenge for the company, Castelaz acknowledged, was developing the charging infrastructure. I’ll get to that in a bit.

It’s nowhere near the same for class-8 trucks, of course, except for a few types like those involved in drayage. Range and weight issues are among the key factors keeping buyers away, not to mention, so far, the lack of product. That’s changing fast.

A 2018 Fleet Advantage survey of American fleets operating heavy trucks asked questions about electric and hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles, and 53% said they don’t see the value and won’t consider the technology for at least another 10 years. Nearly a quarter of respondents (21%) also said they believe electric or hydrogen fuel-cell trucks will never be widely used for over-the-road operations. As for their reasons, 39.4% said they won’t consider the technology because of limited fueling or charging station infrastructure; and 33.3% have concerns about the vehicle’s range or fuel economy. Only 4% of respondents said they are currently procuring these types of trucks.

Down in the medium-duty world, product choices are becoming relatively abundant, and the technology is rapidly maturing. At least as far as the trucks themselves are concerned. We can’t say the same for the charging parts of the equation. We have nowhere near the infrastructure required, though BEV proponents say it will expand in lock step with the number of trucks in service. It may well be that a beefy infrastructure will encourage truck sales. Which is the chicken and which is the egg?

THE CHARGING CONUNDRUM presents a barrier or two as well, and one prominent player in the electric game didn’t mince words in a recent interview with the folks at TU-Automotive online. Lin Zhuang-Khoo, senior VP of strategy at Greenlots, a software provider in the EV charging space (now owned by Shell, interestingly enough), criticized the lack of charging networks standardization and collaboration.