TNT Pilots Two Electric Trucks in Rotterdam
21 August 2007
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| A Smith Edison—an electric vehicle in a Ford Transit shell. |
TNT is beginning a trial of two Smith electric trucks—a 3.5-tonne Smith Edison EV and a 9-tonne Smith Newton EV—in the Rotterdam area as part of the Rotterdam Climate Initiative. Rotterdam’s goal is to reduce CO2 emissions by half by 2025 compared to 1990.
The Edison (earlier post) will be operational around the center of Rotterdam and will make an average of approximately 40 stops for the pick up and delivery of documents and small parcels. The Newton (earlier post) will operate in and around the center of Rotterdam and make 15 to 20 stops when in operation.
The electricity for running these vehicles is certified to be produced by hydropower—operating the vehicles is entirely CO2 neutral.
The Edison, powered by sodium nickel chloride batteries and a 90 kW motor, is capable of 50 mph and a range of up to 150 miles on one battery charge, while still providing up to 1,500 kg of payload. Other major companies who have already committed to orders of Edison include global construction, engineering and utilities company Balfour Beatty; Scottish & Southern Energy, one of the UK’s largest energy suppliers; and retailers Sainsbury’s Online and TK Maxx.
The Newton, powered by sodium nickel chloride batteries and a 120 kW motor, has a top speed of 50 mpg and a range of 150 miles. Payload capacity is 4,000 kg. The Newton’s body panels are built from an ultra light, state-of-the-art fully recyclable composite material manufactured by Omnia.
We are very aware of the impact of our operations on the environment and recognize that we contribute to the problem of climate change. Hence, we feel it’s our responsibility to contribute to a viable long-term solution. Protecting the environment also makes business sense, as our stakeholders are increasingly evaluating us on our environmental impact. TNT foresees electric vehicles to become a key component for future super-urbanized inner city pick up and delivery networks as more and more restrictions are imposed on emissions in urbanized areas.
—Peter Bakker, CEO TNT
If the Rotterdam pilot proves successful, TNT plans to expand the trial to other countries and will consider adding additional electric vehicles to the fleet to serve in other urban locations, where appropriate.
TNT has been running a global program known as Driving Clean for two years so far. Driving Clean includes four main projects: cleaning up the existing fleet, purchases related to the new fleet, investigating possibilities for the future fleet and efforts with TNT partner the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP).
TNT is currently testing twenty biofuel trucks in India and 53 in the Netherlands. Further a number of 161 vehicles run on compressed natural gas in Germany and 5 are piloted in the Netherlands. TNT is currently successfully testing a 7.5-tonne zero emission electric vehicle in London.
The Rotterdam Climate Initiative includes the Municipality of Rotterdam, the Port of Rotterdam, DCMR Environmental Protection Agency Rijnmond, and an association of entrepreneurs (Deltalinqs). The four parties involved have agreed to devote their collective efforts to maximum innovation, maximum mobilization of people and organizations, and substantial investments in projects aimed at a 50% reduction of CO2 emissions.
(A hat-tip to John!)
Very nice. It seems like this power train would be great to use in city buses and taxi fleets as well. Does anyone have the numbers for the price premium over a comparable diesel model?
Posted by: Bob Bastard | 21 August 2007 at 09:37 AM
We note that the battery chemistry is sodium-nickel chloride.
This type of battery must be kept hot in order to function. Given that even the best insulation still loses a certain amount of heat per hour per degrees difference in temperature, one wonders how much energy is needed to keep the batteries up to temperature.
Also, if the batteries are ever allowed to cool to ambient temperature, how many freeze-thaw cycles can the innards withstand?
OK, enough negatives. I wish the operators of these trucks all the best. Perhaps some users might consider a small engine driving a generator, or even a fuel cell, so as to avoid the necessity of depending solely on battery capacity to attain the desired range or endurance.
Posted by: Alex Kovnat | 21 August 2007 at 11:15 AM
Alex ,
the batteries use between 4 to 6% of their capacity in a 24 hr period
to maintain the core temp. But they are here , and available now , and should
be cheap to manufacture
Posted by: andrichrose | 21 August 2007 at 01:27 PM
Another article in GCC mentioned the use of a minuscule SOFC (solid Oxide fuel cell) to trickle charge the sodium nickel chloride battery, with the waste heat of the fuel cell used to keep the battery hot, hence no energy wasted in keeping the battery in operating temperature. Furthermore, this will keep the battery from freeze-thaw cycle.
Posted by: Roger Pham | 21 August 2007 at 09:53 PM
@ Alex Konyat -
Zebra batteries are well insulated, you'd have to park the vehicle for several days before it would reach room temperature again. Thanks to internal resistance, the device heats up again during recharging.
Commercial operators, especially parcel delivery services, operate their vehicle fleets 6-7 day a week, so using Zebras is not an issue for them.
A private user should educate himself about the details of the battery system before buying an EV. His duty cycle may be a poor match for the technology chosen by the vehicle manufacturer.
Posted by: Rafael Seidl | 22 August 2007 at 12:28 AM
... one wonders how much energy is needed to keep the batteries up to temperature.
90 Watts. From 4 hours after shutdown due to temperatue rise during operation. Since private owners will have the car plugged in to recharge at home in the evening, makes no difference. Same at work ultimately. Mendrisio operating trial - no difference in electricity usage between NaNiCl and Nicad in real world usage. On calculations I performed, it would take 50 years with a Zebra plugged in continuously at 90W for the extra electricty cost to equal the price premium of LiIon over NaNiCl.
NaNiCl is by far the best battery available today with 120Wh/kg and less than one third teh nickel useage of NiMH.
Posted by: Emphyrio | 23 August 2007 at 05:10 AM
Rafael, could you give a few brief examples (hypothetical or otherwise) of the correlation between battery chemistries to the type of usage? Thanks.
"A private user should educate himself about the details of the battery system before buying an EV. His duty cycle may be a poor match for the technology chosen by the vehicle manufacturer."
Posted by: DC | 24 August 2007 at 11:03 AM
A few things to note about these hot batteries:
1) The batteries are made with no geostrategic materials, or ones that pose a scale-up speed limitation. That removes some important risk from the ability to manufacture them at major petroleum-replacement scale. Very important for the EV-versus-petroleum war.
2) The larger the vehicle, the less the insulation cost and heat loss should matter, because of decreased surface area-to-volume ratio. With the Zebras you get a partial benefit when you snuggle a few together. Better would be to add a more efficient insulation around the whole bundle.
3) The more efficiency-focused designer can cut the parked-vehicle losses by increasing the insulation. Vacuum multilayer insulation or aerogel insulation under a rough vacuum would do it with very modest weight and volume sacrifice. What Zebra uses is perhaps a more convenient rectangular package but not quite as efficient. Especially since it's so oblong. A short dewar cylinder would be best.
4) Zebras are long-lasting at reasonable cost, so the lifetime operating cost plus that of electricity is less than gasoline now, and they have the potential to come down in price, given volume orders, to perhaps a quarter as much. But they've been waiting for years for those orders.
5) Because the materials and the construction are both so simple, with the cathode and anode both being liquids and only a solid electrolyte that is a form of aluminum oxide, surely it can be made practical to refurbish these batteries once their 1500-3000 cycles are up. That would make them an exemplary long-life and much more cost-effective battery--unbeatable even by hypothetical petroleum that returns to 2000 prices. I can't figure out from their web site what the life-limiting deterioration is.
7) In a hybrid, the keep-warm heat could come from waste heat from the engine exhaust.
8) Zebra uses 2 kg of nickel/kWh. Last I checked, nickel was $37.50/kg so $75/kWh for the nickel, about. It's not the major problem with Zebra cost; the major problem is continued low volume. If they mass-manufactured the batteries and brought the price down near materials cost, then the spiked-price nickel would be almost doubling the battery price. I gather that with about a 10% sacrifice in capacity they could substitute iron, and the battery would be quite cheap again.
Posted by: P Schager | 25 August 2007 at 05:05 AM