Volvo makes its first commercial delivery of medium duty electric truck in Australia

Volvo Trucks says it has made its first true commercial delivery of a medium duty FE electric truck in Australia, to one of its logistics partners Geodis.

The 6×2 FE Electric will be used to transport parts from Matraville headquarters of Geodis to the Minto distrubution centre of Volvo Group Australia in south west Australia. It is the first of more than 80 electric truck orders in Australia since the FE was first put on offer nearly a year ago in Australia.

’The FE Electric, which is capable of hauling a seven-tonne payload, has four batteries on board with 266 kWh capacity.  Range is quoted as up to 220km depending on battery configuration, and the route to be run by the Geodis truck will use around 69kWh. It can charge up at a 50kW charger at the main depot.

Volvo brought two of its electric trucks to Australia two years ago, as part of a trial with Linfox, which leased them to Woolworths and BevChain – and they’re still running. But the FE Electric for Geodis marks the first “purchased and delivered” truck for the company.

Wacol based Volvo Group Regional Logistics Buyer, Jennie Alfredsson first identified the route as being ideal for an electric truck, and suggested it to the company’s head of emerging technology business development in Australia, Paul Illmer.

“This project has been such a great example of multiple stakeholders working together to take yet another step towards decarbonising our industry one truck at a time,” says Illmer.

Volvo Trucks started series production of heavy-duty electric trucks in 2022 at its Swedish base – the first global truck manufacturer to do so – with the US, Germany, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden topping the ranks of Volvo electric truck customers.

In May last year DHL announced its intention to purchase 44 Volvo FL and FE trucks to use for package deliveries in urban zones.