Amazon plans to add another 1,800 battery-electric delivery vans to its growing fleet, this time turning to Mercedes-Benz to supply the zero-emissions vehicles for use in Europe.
The new vans will quickly roll into operation in Europe, but Amazon will have to wait until 2022 before it begins taking delivery of the new vans being developed for its U.S. operations by start-up Rivian. Eventually, that fleet will include 100,000 of the new, zero-emissions models, the biggest order to date by Rivian, which landed $2.5 billion in new funding last month from a consortium of investors led by T. Rowe Price.
While Amazon may be pushing to bring climate change under control, there’s a more practical and “completely unemotional” reason for the surge in EV demand, said Pat Romano, the CEO of ChargePoint. As battery costs drop and useful range increases, all-electric vehicles are both easier to maintain and cheaper to operate.
Read the article at The Detroit Bureau.
