Moving the goods (from the factory to your home)
In my February 26 article on the overall view of the future of electric transportation in 2020 and beyond, I zoomed up to the low orbit altitude, and looked down into the global electric transportation playground. I provided links to over 20 cool and interesting things from charging networks to ice rink Zambonis - examples pointing to the inevitability of an electric transportation future. I am adding more links to that resource page as more innovation emerges (including the announcement of Canadian electric ferries in Toronto and law enforcement purchasing Teslas). Check back regularly at: https://bit.ly/330B4i1.
In another role of mine, a member of the Climate Action Plan 2.0 Transportation Group, I have had to change my personal focus from EV’s to all forms of transportation which touch Salt Spring Island. I have been working with a group of friendly clever forward-thinking individuals looking at what emission-less or at least minimal emission transportation could look like on SSI. Our focus is human powered (walking, skateboards, cycling, rickshaws, pogo sticks), mass transit and reduction of use or the electrification of the remainder. The CAP 2.0 report is anticipated to be released this summer and will provide proactive strategies for us to reduce our emissions.
But back to the world, which is a really big place. Let’s again look at where the smart money is going at a very large scale - delivery trucks. Data shows that long haul intracity trucking moves 71% of all the freight in the U.S. and that amounts to over 9 billion tons per year. There are 3 million employed truck drivers and the average truck is driven about 100,000 miles per year. That is using diesel fuel which is pretty nasty stuff. Remember diesel - Volkswagen is still trying to forget.
If you look at the analysis of Internet Tesla analyst, Stephen Mark Ryan (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKWM8twZnX4&t=468s) (or Google “Solving Money Tesla Semi”), you will see the soon-to-be released Tesla Semi. Yes Charlotte, there is a battery powered semi-trailer truck entering the market later this year. It will provide dramatic reductions of emissions with bulk city-to-city delivery. It looks very spiffy, has a very low drag co-efficient (making it slippery in the air and therefore requires lower battery energy to run), no down time for engine maintenance and eventually, promises to be fully self-driving (no drivers to pay). And it replaces 100% of that nasty diesel. Sounds pretty good from a smart money perspective.
There are always naysayers. If you scroll to the bottom of the above video, you will see comments like “the batteries will be so heavy, there will be no payload availability left”, and “diesel has a higher density of energy than what is capable of being stored in a battery” and “it can’t go very far so you will spend all your time charging”. Sometimes these comments are accompanied with skeptic or hysterical laughter icons. My response is that these are almost identical to the comments that came out when the original Tesla roadster hit the market in 2008 and the Nissan Leaf in North America in 2011. Both those vehicles and their subsequent versions have been best sellers and the manufacturers have had a challenge meeting ever-increasing demand. Breaking news …. Tesla plans to start delivering the Semi to its customers in the 4th quarter of this year. Who is laughing now?
It is not just Tesla changing goods delivery. Amazon is also a very smart smart company with a huge fleet. It was founded by Jeff Bezos who quotes things like “In my view there’s no bad time to innovate”. Jeff is passionate about maximizing efficiency across all the components of his company. What has Amazon done ? Well, it ordered 100,000 fully electric Rivian electric vans - perfect for intercity (or SSI) delivery. Guess where Jeff’s belief system rests?
The future of long haul and local parcel delivery is electric.
I love receiving your respectful comments. I can be reached at: jstanden@ucalgary.ca
In my February 26 article on the overall view of the future of electric transportation in 2020 and beyond, I zoomed up to the low orbit altitude, and looked down into the global electric transportation playground. I provided links to over 20 cool and interesting things from charging networks to ice rink Zambonis - examples pointing to the inevitability of an electric transportation future. I am adding more links to that resource page as more innovation emerges (including the announcement of Canadian electric ferries in Toronto and law enforcement purchasing Teslas). Check back regularly at: https://bit.ly/330B4i1.
In another role of mine, a member of the Climate Action Plan 2.0 Transportation Group, I have had to change my personal focus from EV’s to all forms of transportation which touch Salt Spring Island. I have been working with a group of friendly clever forward-thinking individuals looking at what emission-less or at least minimal emission transportation could look like on SSI. Our focus is human powered (walking, skateboards, cycling, rickshaws, pogo sticks), mass transit and reduction of use or the electrification of the remainder. The CAP 2.0 report is anticipated to be released this summer and will provide proactive strategies for us to reduce our emissions.
But back to the world, which is a really big place. Let’s again look at where the smart money is going at a very large scale - delivery trucks. Data shows that long haul intracity trucking moves 71% of all the freight in the U.S. and that amounts to over 9 billion tons per year. There are 3 million employed truck drivers and the average truck is driven about 100,000 miles per year. That is using diesel fuel which is pretty nasty stuff. Remember diesel - Volkswagen is still trying to forget.
If you look at the analysis of Internet Tesla analyst, Stephen Mark Ryan (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKWM8twZnX4&t=468s) (or Google “Solving Money Tesla Semi”), you will see the soon-to-be released Tesla Semi. Yes Charlotte, there is a battery powered semi-trailer truck entering the market later this year. It will provide dramatic reductions of emissions with bulk city-to-city delivery. It looks very spiffy, has a very low drag co-efficient (making it slippery in the air and therefore requires lower battery energy to run), no down time for engine maintenance and eventually, promises to be fully self-driving (no drivers to pay). And it replaces 100% of that nasty diesel. Sounds pretty good from a smart money perspective.
There are always naysayers. If you scroll to the bottom of the above video, you will see comments like “the batteries will be so heavy, there will be no payload availability left”, and “diesel has a higher density of energy than what is capable of being stored in a battery” and “it can’t go very far so you will spend all your time charging”. Sometimes these comments are accompanied with skeptic or hysterical laughter icons. My response is that these are almost identical to the comments that came out when the original Tesla roadster hit the market in 2008 and the Nissan Leaf in North America in 2011. Both those vehicles and their subsequent versions have been best sellers and the manufacturers have had a challenge meeting ever-increasing demand. Breaking news …. Tesla plans to start delivering the Semi to its customers in the 4th quarter of this year. Who is laughing now?
It is not just Tesla changing goods delivery. Amazon is also a very smart smart company with a huge fleet. It was founded by Jeff Bezos who quotes things like “In my view there’s no bad time to innovate”. Jeff is passionate about maximizing efficiency across all the components of his company. What has Amazon done ? Well, it ordered 100,000 fully electric Rivian electric vans - perfect for intercity (or SSI) delivery. Guess where Jeff’s belief system rests?
The future of long haul and local parcel delivery is electric.
I love receiving your respectful comments. I can be reached at: jstanden@ucalgary.ca