Green Options » united parcel service

FedEx Delving Into the World of Electric Cars. Chooses UK-Based Modec for Initial Order of 10 Delivery Vans

Nick Chambers — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 22:46:57 +0000

Adding to its green fleet of more than 170 hybrid electric delivery vans worldwide, FedEx has decided to try out fully electric vehicles as well with a small group of 10 London-based test trucks.

FedEx has ordered 10 purpose-built zero tailpipe emissions cargo vans from UK-based electric vehicle manufacturer Modec. The new electric trucks are specifically built for the duty cycles required in stop-start city driving, can go 70 miles on one charge, and can haul up to 2 tonnes (2.2 US tons) of cargo.

UPS Drivers Using Bikes to Deliver Packages This Christmas. I Seen it Wit Me Own Two Eyes.

Nick Chambers — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:29:30 +0000

So I came home from work today and saw a woman riding a bike loaded to the gills with cardboard boxes on a heavy duty bike trailer. At first I thought it was just another one of the local crazies that rides their bikes from one side of the town to the other all day long, but I’d never seen her before, and if you’ve lived in my town for as many years as I have, you get to know who our crazies are.

I watched her ride her bike around my neighborhood (it’s a small neighborhood) with a bit of a detached interest as I unloaded things from my car. She stopped every now and then, picked a package out of her clown-car-stuffed trailer and dropped it off at various neighbors’ doors.

UPS is First in Delivery Industry to Test Hydraulic Hybrid Vehicles: 50% Better Fuel Economy and 40% Lower Emissions

Nick Chambers — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 16:30:29 +0000

In partnership with the US Environmental Protection Agency, UPS will begin testing a small fleet of hydraulic hybrid delivery trucks in the United States. The new vehicles can achieve 50-70% better fuel economy, a 40% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, and pay for their extra expense in less than 3 years.

UPS will field two hydraulic hybrids in Minneapolis, MN, in early 2009 and an additional five hydraulic hybrid trucks will be deployed later in 2009 and early 2010. Although this sounds like a tiny fleet, keep in mind that this is the largest scale commercial test of hydraulic hybrids ever conducted.

The UPS hybrid hydraulic truck is a standard-looking 24,000 pound package car, with an EPA-patented diesel series hydraulic hybrid drive attached to the rear axle.

Brown says, “No Left Turns”

Max Lindberg — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 08:32:48 +0000

How much gas money would you save if you didn’t have to make a lot of left turns?

UPS, the delivery people, decided to re-structure the delivery routes taken by drivers to eliminate as many left turns as possible. Now that may sound weird, but how long have you sat in a left turn lane waiting for oncoming traffic to pass, and how many times have you dreaded crossing into oncoming traffic?

The results have been dramatic. UPS says its 95,000 vehicles shaved nearly 30 million miles off its deliveries in 2007, saving the cost of 3 million gallons of gasoline and reducing truck emissions by 32,000 metric tons.

Makes sense to me. Sally and I both plan our drives with right-hand turns in mind, rarely adding an inch to the overall length of the drive, and feeling a lot safer.

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