Trucks
For many fleet owners, investing in electric transportation gives them a considerable competitive advantage when maintaining or acquiring contracts. This is how you can get started with an electric Volvo truck.
Going electric
So, how do you get started with an electric truck – especially if you’re just embarking on the journey to electrify your fleet?
“I recommend beginning with one or two electric trucks,” explains Henrik Mooi, key account manager at Volvo Trucks. “That way, fleets still gain real-world experience but at a manageable level.”
Investing in an electric truck – which usually means switching from a diesel to electric powertrain – can, understandably, be a rather daunting task for many. The challenges of charging, planning routes, vehicle range, driver times and servicing are often cited as reasons by customers to delay a decision.
However, Volvo Trucks helps by breaking the process down to make onboarding as seamless as possible – including crunching those all-important total cost of ownership (TCO) numbers using TCO modelling to help you decide if electric trucks are right for you and your business.
“We start with a consultation to assess the customer’s needs,” says Henrik when explaining the deep support and onboarding that Volvo provides its customers with. “Then we analyse our customers’ typical routes using our simulator. This shows them what proportion of their operations could already go electric."
You don’t have to run a large fleet to benefit from a switch to electric either – although the challenges can sometimes be greater than for large fleet customers. Volvo has tools that enables customers to clearly see where electric trucks are feasible in their operations, the cost of integrating them and how that compares with diesel-powered vehicles.
“Smaller fleets are more hesitant – not because they don’t want to be sustainable, but because they often can’t afford the investment unless the TCO is competitive,” says Henrik. “However, if you do the calculations and it works in your favour, electric becomes a really strong case.”
Together with our customers we’re shaping the transition towards emissions free logistics based on individual use cases and requirements
If the customer sees the value and need for an electric truck, Volvo then begins the process of configuring the actual truck to their specific requirements. “We help them configure the right truck based on vehicle range, weight and power requirements,” says Henrik. “We can also reduce battery packs if range isn’t critical. That saves cost and weight.”
Henrik is refreshingly candid about the challenges that he and his customers have encountered along the way. And he always sees them as a positive because they help inform their learnings and future decision-making.
Planning your charging infrastructure
Another big part of the consultation process is evaluating and planning the charging infrastructure necessary to power the trucks. It’s important to consider this as early as possible, even before you’ve ordered a truck. However, this is something Volvo is able to support with.
“Volvo has established a comprehensive partnership network with energy providers to facilitate assessments of depot infrastructure, grid capacity, ownership and potential shared infrastructure with neighboring operators,” explains Henrik. “Customers then get a 360-degree view of realistic performance expectations, infrastructure feasibility and the financial implications.”
Volvo even provides potential customers with demo electric trucks to test in advance of making a purchase that can, in turn, influence decision-making in other ways. “DFDS, for example, used its demo truck to test different routes, including long-distance ones like from the Netherlands to various major cities in Germany,” says Henrik. “The truck helped them come to the conclusion that Hamburg was a good base to start their electric operations in Germany.”
Henrik describes the strong relationships that he forges with customers embarking on what’s often their first foray into electric transport as ‘partnerships’. “Together with our customers we‘re shaping the transition towards emissions free logistics based on individual use cases and requirements,” he says proudly.
Find out more about Volvo’s electric truck range here.
