Daimler Truck North America

Could autonomous trucks help save the planet?

It’s understood that autonomous trucks boost fuel efficiency compared to human-driven big rigs.

But the potential energy efficiency gains could be far greater.

In a white paper released Tuesday, Aurora Innovation looked at immediate, medium- and longer-term opportunities and found some obvious and not-so-obvious savings.

The headline factoid: Autonomous trucks could achieve 13%-32% net energy efficiency improvement per loaded mile compared to human-driven miles. It is a lot to digest. 

Aurora makes...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/could-autonomous-trucks-help-save-the-planet

Biden’s electric truck effort grilled on Capitol Hill

WASHINGTON — Lawmakers officially kicked off efforts to mitigate — if not derail — the Biden administration’s latest push to electrify the trucking industry during a hearing on Capitol Hill designed to spotlight challenges to powering up an electric grid capable of meeting the zero-emission timeline unveiled by federal regulators in late March.

The hearing before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s highway subcommittee on Tuesday prefaced a Congressional Review Act joint...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/bidens-electric-truck-effort-grilled-on-capitol-hill

Switcheroo: EV Realty secures electricity before launching charging sites

Startups, real estate giants and others developing electric truck charging sites tend to pick locations before being certain they can get electricity in a timely fashion. Startup EV Realty prioritizes having the juice available when it buys a property.

‘Buying by the acre and monetizing by the megawatt’

Patrick Sullivan is like a lot of his peers developing electric infrastructure for fleet charging. He knows how the electric power business works, what it takes to develop and what can frustrate...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/switcheroo-ev-realty-secures-electricity-before-launching-charging-sites

Platform Science secures $125M to grow OEM partnerships

Platform Science, a provider of connected vehicle solutions, announced on Tuesday a significant milestone in its growth journey, securing $125 million in funding aimed at bolstering its presence in the commercial trucking sector. 

Participating in this round are existing investors 8VC, NewRoad Capital Partners, and Prologis Ventures (NYSE:PLD), joined by new backers Activant Capital, Manhattan Ventures Partners and BDT & MSD Partners.

This expansion round also witnessed participation from...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/platform-science-secures-125m-to-grow-oem-partnerships

Biden administration acknowledges ‘challenge’ with new truck emissions rule

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration acknowledged that its aggressive push to decarbonize trucking will be costly — but that the federal government will be here to help.

“The overarching challenge is aligning the market-driven desire from fleets to adopt zero-emission freight vehicles with the resources required to make it successful, and right now, they cost more,” said Gabe Klein, executive director of the U.S. Joint Office of Energy and Transportation.

Speaking to NPR before the release on...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/biden-administration-acknowledges-challenge-with-new-truck-emissions-rule

SEC smackdown and SuperTruck news overwhelm convention dispatches  

The annual Work Truck Week and American Trucking Associations Maintenance & Technology Council pile on stakeholder-specific dispatches each March. But this week bigger stories originated outside the convention halls in Indianapolis and New Orleans.

The Securities and Exchange Commission in Washington is as good a starting point as any.

Lordstown Motors gets an SEC comeuppance

Nearly three years after Hindenberg Research set its sights on Lordstown Motors Corp., accusing the former special purpose...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/sec-smackdown-and-supertruck-news-overwhelm-convention-dispatches

The Whac-A-Mole reality of autonomous trucking regulations

If you thought last year’s veto of a Teamsters-backed ban on heavy-duty autonomous trucking in California put the issue to rest, think again. While 23 states allow at least testing of driverless trucking, emerging challenges resemble the arcade game Whac-A-Mole.

Early-stage commercialized driverless trucking on Interstate 45 in Texas looks likely later this year. The state embraced the technology in 2017. Yet a move to stop driver-out operations percolated in the Texas Legislature last year.

“That...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/the-whac-a-mole-reality-of-autonomous-trucking-regulations

3 trucking majors combine to advance electric infrastructure

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Three of the nation’s largest medium- and heavy-duty truck makers snagged the apropos acronym PACT...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/3-trucking-majors-combine-to-advance-electric-infrastructure

Could shuttered power plants become electric truck charging sites?

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Where will all the power come from to charge the electric trucks expected to someday dominate the...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/could-shuttered-power-plants-become-electric-truck-charging-sites

Daimler Truck manages small gain in 2023 sales

Market leader Daimler Truck grew sales by a scant 1% in 2023. It blamed supply chain bottlenecks for missing its higher goals. Daimler reports full-year financials on March 1 and expects to meet its revenue and profit metrics.

Group sales, which include Portland, Oregon-based Daimler Truck North America, amounted to 526,053 units. That compared with 520,291 units a year earlier.

Daimler dealt with “a continuously challenging supply situation,” CEO Martin Daum said in a news release.

At its Capital...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/daimler-truck-manages-small-gain-in-2023-sales

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