Transporting and towing to warehouse doors is noisy work, with the noise of heavy diesel engines in the background and the occasional noise of container doors, loading ramps and forklifts.
But if recent trends in car production continue, dock and backyard operations may soon start to get a little quieter. -motorized structure trucks with electric vehicle (EV) equivalents.
The switch to electricity for trucks of all kinds is still in its infancy, so few companies have switched their entire fleet to electricity. One of the reasons is the charge. The initial charge of a battery-powered highway truck, for example, far exceeds the charge of a truck equipped with an internal combustion engine. While EV advocates say the premium can be offset through government rebates or recouped through savings on fuel and maintenance, those benefits take time to kick in.
Another thing that restricts the widespread adoption of electric trucks is diversity. For example, battery-powered Class 8 trucks have less than a quarter of the diversity of a diesel version, making them unsuitable for long-haul routes spanning many miles. Brands can charge more batteries to make this diversity greater, the additional weight would decrease the payload capacity of the vehicles, cutting their performance.
But the restrictions that have prevented the deployment of electric trucks on long-haul routes don’t necessarily apply to cars that are used strictly for short distances, cars that many now consider perfectly suited for painting on docks and structure sites.
As for what makes them fit perfectly, electric games offer a number of merits. For one, backyard trucks, also known as terminal tractors, tracking trucks, or backyard jockeys, run 16 or 24 hours a day with new drivers behind the wheel for each shift. This style of prolonged use means that fuel savings temporarily increase with electricity, a great merit at a time when fossil fuel costs have skyrocketed.
And because they tow trailers and boxes inside the barriers of a dock, backyard or intermodal facility, an electric rear truck never deviates from the electric charging infrastructure needed to cool its batteries, reducing the likelihood of it running out of power and getting stuck. .
Reading, Pennsylvania-based Penske Truck Leasing cited any of the strengths when it announced earlier this year that it would add new electric terminal trucks to its U. S. rental fleet. For use in programs that require short-haul travel, such as trailer handling operations in truck fleets, warehouses. and distribution centers, and container terminals.
Penske ordered those cars from Orange EV, a heavy-duty electric car manufacturer founded in Kansas City, Missouri. Up to 24 hours on a single charge and a 50% shorter braking distance than popular pickup trucks thanks to regenerative braking systems that use vehicle momentum to recharge their batteries.
“Yard cars are a wonderful opportunity for electrification,” said Patrick Watt, vice president of select cars and emerging technologies at Penske Truck Leasing. allows drivers to operate under maximum circumstances,” an improvement over previous electric vehicle models that had the strength to compete with diesel, he said.
These attributes also make battery-powered trucks a solid choice for companies looking to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and reduce their carbon footprint, Watt says. Most sensibly, those vehicles are in a position to be deployed now, he adds. We’re at the beginning of the transition to electric cars [in on-road applications], so we continue to see advances in generation. It will be a much bigger and more effective vehicle in 10 years,” says Watt. “But for an electrically structured tractor, the generation you see today will remain effective for a long, long time. “
According to Watt, another explanation for why Penske is investing in electrically structured tractors is that the electrical design has proven popular with structure workers. Silent models that “sit in a diesel vehicle that idles noisily, [spits] emissions and vibrates more [than] an electric truck. It is similar to an electric golf cart; It’s a great environment to sit in while waiting for your next turn. “
But even more importantly is the fact that electrically framed trucks have shown superior availability rates, resistant to mechanical problems and require only short, common charging sessions to keep their batteries energized. “People think about completely discharging the battery of the mobile and then fully charging it, but with only 15 to 20 minutes of charging at each opportunity, it’s an herbal break [for the driver], you never have to do that. Be afraid to reduce it to zero,” he says Watt. Es a mindset shift for other people accustomed to thinking of diesel in miles per gallon or gallons per hour of inconsistent use.
Avoiding breakdowns and delays is a vital promotional point for electric backyard trucks, Zack Ruderman, vice president of sales and marketing for Orange EV, which recently has about 500 heavy electric backyard trucks operating in 130 fleets in 28 states, Canada and the Caribbean. (The company recently expanded its structure truck rental program to include electric tracking vehicles in 48 states. )
“The market says its biggest challenge is downtime [when trucks need repairs],” Ruderman says. “Renting a replacement truck on a short-term basis is expensive in this market. Maintaining additional trucks is too. [Fleet management is] a mission-critical operation. »
To keep downtime to a minimum, Orange says its battery-powered trucks can be recharged when motive power takes a break anyway. As noted by Penske, this recharge time is temporarily added to lunch periods and 15-minute rest shifts.
The extra availability comes from avoiding long stays in the repair shop, Ruderman says. Orange EV claims that battery-powered trucks break down less than diesel models. In addition, they lack parts such as engine transmissions, emission units and radiators that take time. (and are expensive) to maintain.
They are also designed for versatility. Orange EV claims that its base style can do 70% of all the jobs a diesel style can do, less than 10% of the jobs that reach steep slopes and 20% that require top speeds. To fill those gaps, the manufacturer plans to launch a tougher, faster and tougher “port truck” version in 2023. “Within 3 years, more than 50% of new orders for structural trucks will be electric vehicles. Yard trucks are at the forefront of electric transformation,” says Ruderman.
Ruderman is probably right. Companies across the supply chain have been testing electrically structured trucks in recent years and like what they see. The result has been an immediate increase in production and sales of battery-powered trucks for dock and jobsite control tasks.
Many of those users first chose electric models for environmental reasons, such as greening their operations or achieving the company’s environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals. But pilot tests gave them more reasons to continue with electrically structured trucks, as they discovered. Additional benefits in terms of fuel economy, extended uptime and motive force satisfaction.