Finnish postal service Posti has deployed its first electric truck, a Volvo FM 42T Electric semi-trailer truck.
The new FM Electric will be seen on routes in the Helsinki metropolitan area as well as in pilots for regular services between the PKS terminal in Vantaa, the Lieto terminal in Turku and the Pirkkala terminal in Tampere.
The truck has a battery capacity of 540kWh and a range of over 300 km. Fast charging can be done with up to 250kW of power. The vehicle is currently charged primarily at the high-capacity charging stations at Post’s PKS terminal and the Pirkkala and Lieto terminals. It can also be charged at customer loading and unloading points, main road rest areas, gas stations and other public charging points.
Posti plans to have 10 electric trucks in service by the end of the year
. At the end of 2022, it had around 200 electric vans, with this number set to rise to 300 this year. All the electricity used by Posti is renewable, so its electric vehicles are completely fossil-free.
In addition, Posti has a fleet of 29 trucks that use liquefied biogas (LBG), and six more of these trucks are being put into service in 2023. The post also has 12 medium-heavy delivery trucks that run on compressed biogas (CBG) in the pipeline; these will join two currently in operation. In October 2022, Posti launched a new roadmap for clean transportation vehicles, which includes a plan to introduce up to a thousand new electric, biogas and hydrogen vehicles by 2030.
Anna Heino, head of climate and nature at Posti, said, “Our goal is to be fossil-free in all road transport within the next six and a half years. Last year we already drove more than 20,000,000km fossil-free, and our rapidly renewing clean fleet will take us towards our target.
Ari Olli, vice president of transportation services at Posti, said, “We are gaining experience with different fossil-free propulsion systems for all fleet sizes. We use fossil-free vehicles on a variety of routes, both for local transport in urban areas and for longer line hauls between terminals. For example, we have already been using Volvo’s 17-metric-ton electric truck to deliver freight in the Helsinki metropolitan area for about a year and a half, and the experience is positive. As fossil-free propulsion technology develops rapidly, their range and cost-effectiveness compared to diesel are improving all the time.”
Read more key vehicles/fleet updates from the parcel and postal technology industry, here.