UPS places $70m order for propane vehicles and fuel systems
Package delivery giant UPS is investing in more “green” trucks, announcing plans to purchase 1,000 vehicles that will be powered by propane. The company said yesterday that it will replace gasoline and diesel fueled trucks with the alternative-fuelled vehicles, in a $70m investment that will also see 50 fueling stations installed at UPS locations.
The trucks are destined for rural areas such as in the US States of Louisiana and Oklahoma.
Although propane is a fossil fuel, it is seen as more efficient than gasoline/petrol or diesel. UPS said vehicles can travel up to 200 miles on a tank of propane.
The vehicles are expected to displace 3.5m gallons of conventional gasoline and diesel each year with the new vehicles set to travel 25m miles annually.
The benefits for UPS also come with the United States stepping up its domestic production of natural gas, which means more price stability and a more accessible supply of propane.
The introduction of the new vehicles and infrastructure will begin in the middle of this year, for completion early in 2015.
UPS said it has already secured environmental certifications for the vehicles with the federal Environment Protection Agency and the State of California’s regulator, the California Air Resources Board.
UPS will be using its propane trucks on rural routes
Roy Willis, president and chief executive of the Propane Education & Research Council, a non-profit that worked with UPS to get its certifications for the trucks, said the testing of the technology by UPS was a “major milestone” for the whole propane industry.
“This announcement is the culmination of many entities bringing together the best in propane technology to achieve the greatest economic and environmental results,” he said.
The new wave of propane-powered trucks follows a trial in which 20 of the vehicles were operated over the winter in Gainesville, Georgia. UPS already operates 900 propane-powered vehicles in Canada.
The new vehicles come from Freightliner Custom Chassis Corp, using GM engines and system integration from Powertrain Integration, while the propane fuel system was supplied by CleanFuel USA.
UPS now has 3,150 alternative-fuel vehicles in its US fleet.
