The City of Newcastle on Tuesday unveiled its first electric truck, a medium rigid Hino truck that replaces a diesel vehicle currently in use by the City’s Park and Recreation team.
The launch of Hino electric truck follows previous trials of electric vehicles within the City of Newcastle’s council fleet, including the replacement of four pool cars with four EVs.
Expected to reduce the City of Newcastle’s carbon emissions by more than 20 tonnes each year, Deputy Lord Mayor Declan Clausen says that purchasing the Hino is part of the council’s broader sustainability strategy aimed at delivering a 100% reduction in carbon emissions from council vehicles during the next decade.
“City of Newcastle was the first council in NSW to shift to 100% renewable energy in our operations, with our own solar farm at Summerhill and a power purchase agreement with the Sapphire Wind Farm,” said Clausen.
“Fossil-based liquid fuels such as diesel and unleaded petrol in CN cars, trucks, waste fleet, plant and equipment account for more than 90% of our remaining operational carbon emissions.
“This is produced from more than 1.6 million litres of fuel used annually across CN’s operations.
“City of Newcastle is working to deliver the adopted Climate Action Plan 2021-2025, which sets out a roadmap for achieving emission reduction within CN operations. This includes the development of a Fleet Transition Plan to target zero emissions from vehicles for 100% of the fleet by 2030.”
The City of Newcastle switched over to 100% renewables on New Years Day 2020 across all its operations, including large sites such as libraries, galleries, administration centres and work depots, along with over 200 small sites and more than 14,000 streetlights.
Adam Clarke, the Sustainability Manager at the City of Newcastle and who has regularly written about Newcastle’s efforts on The Driven’s sister site RenewEconomy, highlighted in late-2020 his city’s need to begin focusing on decarbonising its transport emissions.
Separately, the City of Newcastle will also be participating in the New South Wales government’s recently announced Drive Electric NSW EV fleet incentive which is designed to help support the transition of its passenger fleet.
On top of that, the City of Newcastle is helping support the community’s transition to electric vehicles as well as developing a council-owned public EV charging network which currently includes seven chargers installed across four sites, together providing 11 charging bays, with additional sites to be added this year.
Joshua S. Hill is a Melbourne-based journalist who has been writing about climate change, clean technology, and electric vehicles for over 15 years. He has been reporting on electric vehicles and clean technologies for Renew Economy and The Driven since 2012. His preferred mode of transport is his feet.