Report highlights need to electrify trucking fleet

A new report from Adiona Tech outlines a need to electrify the trucking fleet in the United States.

According to the report, titled “Connected Thinking U.S.,” large trucks need to be electrified before passenger vehicles. Adiona provides a wealth of stats to back up that claim.

To start, combination trucks make up 1% of vehicles on the road. However, they are responsible for 18% of vehicle emissions. That does not include public transport, municipal or agricultural vehicles.

According to Adiona, the average fuel consumption of a combination truck is 20 times higher than a typical passenger vehicle. Moving just five combination trucks to greener technology would be as beneficial as 100 households buying an electric vehicle.

The report also claims that the United States produces 2.5 times as many commercial vehicles as passenger vehicles. However, only 0.4% of new U.S. truck sales were electric in 2022. In 2009, the gap between the number of commercial and passenger vehicles manufactured in the U.S. was just 1.4 million. By 2021, that number had ballooned to 6 million.

“Vehicle manufacturing in the U.S. is a traditionally strong industry with a long history,” the report states. “It makes sense for U.S. manufacturers to carry that strength into the transition to EVs. If the U.S. does not maintain its position on commercial vehicle production and adequately incentivize manufacturers to modernize with electric or hydrogen fleets, China, Japan and South Korea could soon dominate the entire market.”

Adiona points out that larger vehicles are better suited for hydrogen fuel cells rather than lithium batteries.

Some cities are more problematic than others in terms of fuel waste. According to Adiona, the top five cities for fuel wasted due to congestion are Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Miami. Los Angeles and New York waste 10 times more fuel due to congestion than the least wasteful large city, San Diego. In Los Angeles and New York City combined, congestion creates nearly 6 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions every year.

“America needs to aggressively decarbonize the biggest emitters on the road, large freight and delivery vehicles,” Adiona CEO and founder Richard Savoie said in a statement. “The U.S. automotive industry is at a crossroads, but it needs to act now to electrify every car on the road. Doing so requires connected thinking and collective action. We cannot transform the national fleet of nearly 300 million vehicles overnight, so we need to make decisions that make the biggest difference, for the lowest effort first.”

He added that data shows consumer adoption of EVs should not be America’s No. 1 priority.

“Electrifying fleets is by far the most efficient way to reduce vehicle emissions,” Savoie said. “Every battery we put in a combination truck counts for 20 households buying an EV, and businesses often have fleets of hundreds of vehicles. We must prioritize the electrification of these vehicles that are on the road most, travel the longest distances and are the least fuel-efficient.”

According to an Adiona news release, if countries like the U.S. do not drastically reduce their transport emissions now, global net zero goals will fail. We will not limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius as per the Paris Climate Accord, and the consequences could be dire. LL

OOIDA stance on electric trucks

The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association has an opposing stance on where electric vehicles should go first.

OOIDA President Todd Spencer told Land Line that passenger vehicles, not large trucks, should be the first fleet to go electric.

“No EVs can operate without an infrastructure grid that supports charging stations, and without charging stations no EV of any size is practical or workable,” Spencer said. “Automobiles and light trucks would be the logical place to start the evolution. People, including truckers, will embrace what makes sense for what they need to do.”

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