Our electric trucks are 480 volt, thats 96 fancy deep cycle type batteries ( cost about $80,000 to replace). It takes a bunch of electricity to charge them, 8 hours for a full charge and 75 mile radius or you call the tow truck. On flat ground they won't travel go as far as a hilly area, they regenerate on the down hills. Torque is quite good with them, from a dead stop they will keep up with traffic, on the road, up to about 40 mph, they do alright, but thats about it. The top speed is around 53 mph and maybe 60 mph on a down hill. The cost was in the $180,000 range, we got them about 1/2 price thanks to gov grants for clean energy. But over all, no way are we saving anything. Good thing we got to keep the older diesel for back up!
Our diesel fleet of school buses ranges from 1 year old to 15 years old. The new ones are averaging 9.92 mpg! and thats a full size 65 passenger. Thats almost double what they got 10 years ago, plus the tail pipes still look like new clean metal after 20,000 miles. If diesels keep advancing like they have been, I can see they will be the future. To bad all the big three just see horse power and sales figures. Not everyone needs a 400 hp diesel pickup. I would take a small truck that got 40 to 50 mpg any day.
Joe
