The country’s first commercial application of a range-extended electric trucks launched in Northern California’s wine country Tuesday, featuring a unique range-extended, turbine-electric powertrain developed by Wrightspeed Inc. The heavy-duty Class 8 Freightliner delivered to The Ratto Group, a Sonoma County solid waste collection and recycling business, is the first of at least 15 that will be integrated into the trash company’s fleet over the next year, said Tim Dummer, Wrightspeed’s chief business officer.
The contract could lead to an ongoing relationship that sees all 130 of Ratto’s residential trash and recycling trucks retrofitted with the turbine-electric powertrain, said Lou Ratto, chief operating officer of the privately held company.
Neither company would disclose the exact value of the multimillion dollar contract, which is thought to be in the range of $3 million to $5 million. Ratto is funding the program internally.
Using electric power for a refuse truck is difficult because the vehicle’s demanding duty cycle — with frequent stops and starts and heavy loads — drains the electric powertrain’s batteries quickly.
But “The Route” powertrain developed by Wrightspeed, an Alameda, Calif.-based green transport company, uses a micro-turbine generator to provide electricity to the traction motors when the truck’s grid-charged battery pack is depleted, Dummer said. The turbine is “fuel agnostic, but most customers use either diesel or gasoline,” he said.
Optimized for the refuse industry, the Wrightspeed system can power a 66,000-pound GVW truck, delivering up to 24 miles on battery power before the range extender kicks in. After that, range is unlimited as long as there is fuel for the turbine.
With fuel efficiency the equivalent of up to 7 mpg in combined electricity-liquid fuel operation, the powertrain can slash annual fuel consumption by 70 percent or more compared with the average diesel refuse truck. Ratto said he expects a fuel savings of at least 50 percent in hilly Sonoma County.
Wrightspeed’s range extender system is an important tool for “making electric drive work in some heavy-truck applications and is unique in the refuse industry” said Bill Van Amburg, senior vice president and head of truck programs for CalStart, the Pasadena-based clean transportation technologies consortium.
Wrightspeed is headed by Ian Wright, Tesla Motors’ co-founder and vice president of vehicle development. He left the Palo Alto, Calif., electric car company in late 2004.
At a June waste management and recycling conference in Las Vegas, Mack Trucks unveiled an electric garbage truck that has a powertrain developed by Wrightspeed. The truck is based on Mack’s LR model and features a range-extended electric powertrain. The system uses electric motors to drive the front wheels and allows the truck to benefit from more load-hauling low-end torque than conventional diesel engines.
Hybrid and electric trucks make sense for garbage collection because their braking systems recapture energy as the vehicles make hundreds of stops in neighborhoods, according to industry analysts.
To read the full story, visit https://www.trucks.com/2016/11/02/fleet-electric-trucks-debuts/.