Mercedes Benz Urban eTruck
Daimler Trucks North America Plans for the Future
“Electric drive systems previously only saw extremely limited use in trucks. Nowadays costs, performance and charging times develop further so rapidly that now there is a trend reversal in the distribution sector: the time is ripe for the electric truck. In light distribution trucks, our Fuso Canter E-Cell has already been undergoing intensive customer trials since 2014. And with the Mercedtruckz Urban eTruck, we are now electrifying the heavy distribution segment up to 26 tons. We intend to establish electric driving as systematically as autonomous and connected driving.”– Dr. Wolfgang Bernhard, Daimler Trucks & Buses Board of Management.
“Electric drive systems previously only saw extremely limited use in trucks. Nowadays costs, performance and charging times develop further so rapidly that now there is a trend reversal in the distribution sector: the time is ripe for the electric truck. In light distribution trucks, our Fuso Canter E-Cell has already been undergoing intensive customer trials since 2014. And with the Mercedtruckz Urban eTruck, we are now electrifying the heavy distribution segment up to 26 tons. We intend to establish electric driving as systematically as autonomous and connected driving.”– Dr. Wolfgang Bernhard, Daimler Trucks & Buses Board of Management.
Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck highlight by TruckVideos.Net
Stuttgart – The world’s most successful truck manufacturer Daimler Trucks is presenting the Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck in Stuttgart today, as the first fully electric truck with an admissible total weight of up to 26 tonnes. This means that in the future, heavy trucks will take part in urban distribution operations with zero local emissions and hardly a whisper. The market launch of this technology is conceivable for Daimler Trucks at the beginning of the next decade. In the light distribution sector, Daimler Trucks has already been impressively demonstrating the day-to-day suitability of the fully electric truck in customer trials with the Fuso Canter E-Cell since 2014. The development of electric trucks and series production maturity are fixed parts of the strategy of Daimler Trucks to build on our technological leadership. For this purpose a considerable part of the future investments by the truck division in the fields of research and development flow in the further development of the full electric drive.
Growing Urbanization=Fully Electric Trucks
Better air quality, lower noise, and restricted-access zones are now important keywords in large metropolises worldwide because more and more people worldwide are moving to cities. 2008 was the first year in which more people lived in cities than in the countryside. The trend is continuing: The UN predicts a global population of nine billion people by 2050, with approximately 70 percent of them living in cities. In future, it will be necessary to transport goods in urban environments for increasing numbers of people – and with the lowest possible emissions and noise. By now large cities such as London or Paris are considering a ban on internal combustion engines in city centers in the future. That means: there will be fully electric trucks ensuring the supply of humans with food or other goods of daily needs.
Fast enhancement of battery capacity while significantly lower costs
Until quite recently, the use of fully electric drives systems in trucks seemed to be unimaginable – especially because of the high costs of the batteries coupled with a low range. The technology has now become much more mature. In particular battery cells rapidly developing further. Daimler Trucks expects the costs of batteries to lower by the factor 2.5 between 1997 and 2025 – from 500 Euro/kWh down to 200 Euro/kWh. At the same time, performance will improve by the same factor over the same period – from 80 Wh/kg up to 200 Wh/kg.
Stefan Buchner, Head of Mercedes-Benz Trucks said,
“With the Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck, we are underlining our intention to systematically developing the electric drive in trucks to series production maturity. This means that we will begin to integrate customers, so as to gain valuable joint experience with respect to the operating ranges and the charging infrastructure in daily transport operations. Because we think the entry of this technology into the series production is already conceivable at the beginning of the next decade.“
Technically, the Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck is based on a heavy-duty, three-axle short-radius Mercedes-Benz distribution truck. In addition, however, the developers at Daimler Trucks have totally revised the drive concept: The entire conventional drivetrain being replaced by a new electrically driven rear axle with electric motors directly adjacent to the wheel hubs – derived from the electric rear axle which was developed for the Mercedes-Benz Citaro hybrid bus. The power is supplied by a battery pack consisting of three lithium-ion battery modules. This results in a range of up to 200 km – enough for a typical daily delivery tour. Thanks to the integrated concept with motors adjacent to the wheel hubs, the batteries are housed in a crash-proof location inside the frame.
As the EU Commission is in favor of increasing the permissible gross vehicle weight of trucks with alternative drives by up to one tonne, this will more or less level out the weight surplus of the electric drive. This will raise the permissible gross vehicle weight of the Urban e Truck from 25 to 26 tons, which will bring the original extra weight down to 700 kg compared with a directly comparable IC-engined truck.
Further information about Mercedes-Benz is available online: www.media.daimler.com and www.mercedes-benz.com
About Daimler
Daimler at a glance Daimler AG is one of the most successful automotive manufacturers in the world. With its Mercedes-Benz Cars, Daimler Trucks, Mercedes-Benz Vans, Daimler Buses and Daimler Financial Services divisions, the vehicle manufacturer is one of the largest producers of premium cars and the largest globally operative manufacturer of commercial vehicles. Daimler Financial Services offers financing, leasing, fleet management, insurance services, investments, credit cards and innovative mobility services. Company founders Gottlieb Daimler and Carl Benz wrote history with the invention of the automobile in 1886. As an automotive pioneer, Daimler continues to shape the future of mobility today: the company applies innovative and green technologies to produce safe and superior vehicles which fascinate and delight customers. Daimler invests continually in the development of alternative powertrains – from hybrid vehicles to all-electric vehicles with battery or fuel cell – with the goal of making emission-free driving possible in the long term. Furthermore, the company follows a consistent path towards accident-free driving and intelligent connectivity all the way to autonomous driving. Daimler willingly accepts the challenge of meeting its responsibility towards society and the environment. Daimler sells its vehicles and services in nearly all the countries of the world and has production facilities in Europe, North and South America, Asia and Africa. In addition to Mercedes-Benz, the world’s most valuable automotive brand, plus Mercedes-AMG, Mercedes-Maybach and Mercedes me, Daimler’s brand portfolio includes smart, Freightliner, Western Star, BharatBenz, FUSO, Setra, Thomas Built Buses and the Daimler Financial Services brands: Mercedes-Benz Bank, Mercedes-Benz Financial, Daimler Truck Financial, moovel, car2go and mytaxi. The company is listed on the Frankfurt and Stuttgart stock exchanges (stock exchange symbol DAI). In 2015, the Daimler Group sold around 2.9 million vehicles and employed a total workforce of 284,015 people. Revenue totaled €149.5 billion and EBIT amounted to €13.2 billion.
