Swedish furniture retail giant Ikea’s Australian arm has added another clean and green electric delivery truck to its fleet, launched by transport service provider All Purpose Transport in Queensland.
The all-electric truck is another stepping stone towards Ikea Australia’s commitment to transition to a fully electric fleet by 2025 that it announced in March.
The commitment, which complements the home furnishings retailer’s leading role in switching to renewables including commercial scale solar and clean energy bulk buys, will see Ikea transition its fleet of 100 large trucks and 250 smaller trucks to 10% all-electric by FY2020 and 100% by FY2025.
The new truck from Victoria-based electric automotive company SEA Electric which creates zero emissions heavy duty vehicles from procured bodies and proprietary electric drivelines joins three others operated on behalf of Ikea in Sydney by ANC.
The electric delivery truck was launched to representatives of Ikea, All Purpose Transport and SEA Electric on Wednesday at an event that was attended by Queensland Minister for main roads and transport Mark Bailey.
Bailey congratulated the All Purpose Transport team via social media channel Twitter, saying that the move to go electric represented “great leadership in innovative clean energy technology“.
Well done All Purpose Transport on their first 100% electric home delivery trucks for their clients like IKEA in SEQ – great leadership in innovative clean energy technology by both them & @qta_trucking pic.twitter.com/3ZtHHr2XFD
— Mark Bailey MP (@MarkBaileyMP) December 10, 2019
Parent group Inter Ikea has also committed €220 million ($A356 million) to transition to a “climate positive business” by taking measures such as investing in forest-based schemes to sequester carbon and sourcing energy from renewable sources in its supply chain.
Globally, Ikea’s greenhouse gas footprint is estimated at 26.9 million tonnes of CO2 equivalents year.
The Hino 917 truck, fitted a SEA-Drive 120a system with up to 250kW power, 800Nm continuous torque and a 136kWh battery, will help reduce Ikea’s dependence on fossil fuels and its resultant carbon emissions.
“The 100% electric power-system offers a range of up to 300 kms (unladen), zero emissions saving an estimated 36 tonnes of CO2 per annum when compared to a typical diesel equivalent, enhanced driver comfort and safety with little heat and noise, and reduced cost of total ownership,” said Glen Walker, SEA Electric’s regional director of Oceania in a statement.
All Purpose Transport, which currently operates an owner-driver model, will evaluate the Hino 917 truck to establish the pros and cons for use as a delivery truck before considering an EV truck lease scheme for drivers, with a conservative plan to be 10% electric by the end of 2020.
“All Purpose Transport is a progressive transport business that wants to take a leadership role in Queensland towards reducing emissions with the introduction of Electric Vehicles,” said All Purpose Transport general manager Paul Kahlert said in a statement.
Speaking at the event, minister Bailey acknowledged that while Australia’s adoption of electric vehicles has been slow, the transition is now picking up pace.
SEA Electric CEO Tony Fairweather was encouraged by the minister’s speech saying that, “I am confident that this will be the start of many more electric commercial vehicles for Queensland.”
Bridie Schmidt is associate editor for The Driven, sister site of Renew Economy. She has been writing about electric vehicles since 2018, and has a keen interest in the role that zero-emissions transport has to play in sustainability. She has participated in podcasts such as Download This Show with Marc Fennell and Shirtloads of Science with Karl Kruszelnicki and is co-organiser of the Northern Rivers Electric Vehicle Forum. Bridie also owns a Tesla Model Y and has it available for hire on evee.com.au.