compressed natural gas

Of floor mops, M&M coatings … and battery packs 

What do coatings for M&M chocolate candies, O-Cedar floor mops and battery packs for electric trucks have in common?

All three come from German industrial conglomerate Freudenberg Group. The company operates many other seemingly incongruous businesses from filtration to home cleaning products.

A history of handoffs

Freudenberg’s battery business is an appropriate Truck Tech topic. But not as tasty than M&Ms, for which it makes the hard shell coatings through its Capol business unit. 

The...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/of-floor-mops-mm-coatings-and-battery-packs

Diesel distancing propels alternative fuel options

Renewable natural gas, battery-electric and hydrogen-powered trucks all target fleets switching from diesel ahead of coming regulations requiring costly additional emissions after-treatment. Which alternative will win? Possibly all of them.

Vouchers make first Nikola fuel cell trucks ‘cheaper than a diesel’

Back in 2018, Anheuser-Busch placed an initial order for up to 800 Nikola fuel cell trucks. Ever so slowly, that is becoming a reality.

After numerous missteps and setbacks, Nikola produced 42...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/diesel-distancing-propels-alternative-fuel-options

ACT Expo: Shell Starship 2.0 — a diesel intruder at an electric truck show

LONG BEACH, Calif. — In the 1987 film “The Untouchables,” the late actor Sean Connery sarcastically accused a would-be assailant of bringing “a knife to a gunfight.”

The presence of the diesel-powered Shell Starship 2.0 at this week’s Advanced Clean Transportation Expo is a sort of metaphor for the famous scene, a pivotal moment in the Prohibition-era crime drama.

Diesel fuel is no more the point of Shell’s futuristic technology test bed for freight efficiency than the knife-wielding mobster who...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/act-expo-shell-starship-20-a-diesel-intruder-at-an-electric-truck-show

Truck Talk: Autonomous patent edition

This week, we look at how technology patents suggest possible winners and also-rans in the autonomous trucking race to commercialization. And Cummins cuts a deal that replaces the sunsetting of its 20-year-old natural gas joint venture with Westport Fuel Systems.

A patent argument

Sizing up the prospects of autonomous software trucking companies needs a scorecard, or maybe a Racing Forum. There’s no question that a horse race to commercialization is underway. Distinguishing winners from also-rans...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/truck-talk-autonomous-patent-edition