CHARGED Electric Vehicles Magazine – May-June 2019

Max. 2 Aux. Switches, NO/NC

Silver Pla ted Main Ter minals

Comparable Foot Prin t

UL60947-4-1 Pending

EN 61373 shock and vibration

Extr emely Cost Competitive

Ger man Engineering

Breaking Capacity up to

750A in Both Directions

Inrush Currents Capacity,

up to 2500A

Up to 1500Vdc/ac Applications

Tested Short Cir cuit

Currents up to 10kA

Rated Currents of 150A,

300A & 500A

50% less Coil

Power Consumption

60% lower contact resistance

I nductive Loads (L/R>0.1ms)

C310

Bidirectional

DC Contactor

http://www.schaltbau-na.com

[email protected]

In 2018, at California’s Global
Climate Action Summit, IKEA
CEO Jesper Brodin announced a
commitment to using EVs for the
last-mile portion of all of its prod-
uct shipments by 2025.
Now the Swedish retailer says it
has already electrified all its local
delivery vehicles in Shanghai, and
plans to do the same in Los Angeles, New York, Paris and Amsterdam by
2020.
Collaboration is the key to making the transition so quickly, IKEA’s
Head of Sustainable Mobility Angela Hultberg told GreenBiz’s Katie Feh-
renbacher. “I think collaboration is one of the biggest lessons learned. We
can’t do this by ourselves, and this can’t happen in isolation.”
IKEA doesn’t own its own delivery fleet – it relies on around 10,000 ve-
hicles operated by delivery partners that include DHL, UPS and the Swed-
ish and Danish postal service PostNord. For IKEA to realize its ambitious
electrification plans, it needs to bring its fleet partners on board.
It’s not such a tough sell, because delivery firms around the world have
been testing EVs for some years now, and the savings on fuel and mainte-
nance costs are well documented. A 2018 report from the North American
Council for Freight Efficiency found that medium-duty urban delivery
vans are excellent candidates for electrification. “What is available today is
good enough to start,” Hultberg said. “It’s already here.”
Delivery-industry heavyweights DHL, UPS and FedEx have been buying
electric delivery vans for some time. DHL recently announced plans to
roll out 63 NGEN-1000 electric delivery vans made by US manufacturer
Workhorse. UPS ordered 950 N-GEN vans from Workhorse last June.
FedEx ordered 1,000 electric vans from California EV startup Chanje in
November.
In Shanghai, IKEA worked with distribution partner Beiye New Brother
Logistics and EV leasing company DST to develop an EV and charging
platform. “It changed our ways of working a bit, but they were open to it,”
said Hultberg. Beiye “was eager to go on this journey with us” and “wasn’t
afraid of trying new ways.”
IKEA will continue to collaborate with partners as it electrifies the next
four cities on the list, although it may not do things the same way it did
in Shanghai. “There are four ways at least to solve this,” said Hultberg.
“There’s no blueprint solution.”
Fehrenbacher predicts that other large retailers will soon be getting
charged. Etsy and Amazon are also exploring ways to reduce the carbon
footprints of their shipping operations.

IKEA and delivery partners electrify

last-mile delivery around the world

Images courtesy of IKEA