Commercial EVs

It’s official – Isuzu has announced the official start of production for its highly anticipated new electric cab and chassis, the Isuzu NRR-EV (and I’m super excited about it).

When Amazon co-founded The Climate Pledge in 2019, it announced plans to put more than 100,000 electric delivery vans on the road by 2040. Five years later, and the house that Bezos built just crossed the 15,000 EV milestone.

It was always going to be a formality, but Isuzu’s new medium duty electric truck has been awarded zero-emission certifications from both the California Air Resource Board (CARB) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for the Isuzu NRR-EV. With those in hand, the truck is now available for sale nationwide.

Kodiak Robotics is touting its latest milestone in fully autonomous commercial vehicles today after completing a driverless truck delivery to partner and customer Atlas Energy Solutions in Texas. The delivery marks a key step in beginning commercialized autonomous operations as early as next year.

Meet the Club Car UTV. A small, neighborhood-legal EV that its makers says combines the practicality of a pickup truck and the efficiency of a golf cart to shuttle workers and supplies around the job site. It’s so good, in fact, that it’s making me ask: is this the most practical electric pickup you can buy?

In this special vacation episode of Quick Charge, we explore the historic dive in global diesel demand, and whether it’s being caused inflation and a slowing economy or the rapid rise in EV sales displacing millions of gallons of oil demand.

Truck buyers looking for electric options to add to your fleet take note: 2023 MY Ford F-150 Lightning pickups are now more than $200 cheaper to lease per month than their gas-powered siblings.

Commercial EV technology developer REE Automotive has added some clout to its growing order book as global transportation provider Penske has signed on to help demonstrate the former’s PC-7 electric truck to its customers and help facilitate sales.

Isuzu is excited to announce the development of all-new, zero-emission Isuzu class 6 & 7 F series trucks utilizing an Accelera by Cummins battery-electric powertrain for both the US and Canada. They’re so excited, in fact, that they’re announcing it two years ahead of time!

Ford Pro is now taking orders for the newest version of its commercial EV, the E-Transit, with up to 32% more range and faster charge times.

Harbinger Motors, a startup building medium-duty electric commercial vehicle chassis, has just opened its manufacturing facility in Garden Grove, CA, with an aim to deliver the first upfront cost-competitive medium duty EVs by the end of this year.

Less than six months after a seemingly dooming bankruptcy filing, Volta Trucks has reemerged from the ashes, fresh with redemptive capital and a leaned-down business plan. The commercial EV startup can now resume its work in delivering its electric last-mile trucks to customers this year.

Severe-duty vehicle manufacturer Autocar has partnered with Rocsys to deploy the latter’s hands-free EV chargers, expanding the technology across the former’s electric terminal tractors. Together, Autocar and Rocsys have already secured an initial fleet customer en route to full-scale integration of easier, intuitive charging infrastructure across the entire segment.

Electric freight mobility specialist Einride has opened its first Smartcharger station in the US, launching as the largest operational charging site for heavy-duty EVs on the continent. The new station is strategically located in a busy freight corridor, providing electric truck drivers with 65 charging piles powered by Voltera.

EV startup REE Automotive is off to a newsworthy week so far, dropping three separate updates regarding its business strategies and unique technology. In addition to a new collaboration to provide technology to aerospace developer Airbus UpNext, REE closed a public offering of ordinary shares this morning, totaling close to $15 million. Lastly, the public is getting its first public look at REE’s all-electric demo vehicle at Work Truck Week 2024.

Mullen Automotive announced it has begun road testing Class 1 electric vans equipped with solid-state polymer batteries alongside footage of the initial run. The energy-dense cells fit in the same pack design but offer a significantly higher range – even higher than Mullen anticipated.

A new 38 port electric truck charging depot and maintenance hub is coming online to service Southern California’s ports and logistics centers, along with 50 new electric trucks from Volvo and Daimler.

Commercial EV manufacturer Xos, Inc. has partnered with renowned lifestyle vehicle expert Winnebago to electrify the commercial segment further. Together, the companies have developed a fully electric chassis to support Winnebago’s specialty vehicle division, which currently offers custom builds of Class C RVs and Class A EV buses for several use cases.

The iconic Mack Trucks brand has been taking the medium duty market by storm, bringing big truck features and functionality to the segment like never before. The market has responded, and Mack is selling as many as they can make — so they’re going to start making more.

Einride has announced it is helping world-renowned brewery Heineken electrify its freight operations between the Netherlands and Germany. Heineken put several electric trucks into operation last month as it looks to deploy Einride’s entire ecosystem across its fleet operations in the future.

Mercedes invited us out to drive the new eSprinter, the electric version of Mercedes’ cargo van, and if there’s one thing I want you to understand about it is: it’s a van, but it’s electric.