Overview
Deliveries to and within inner-city areas are a fundamental cause of temporary local bottlenecks in traffic and dominate the local peak concentration periods of relevant pollutants. A shift of deliveries into night time would contribute to decongesting roads. A conflict arises in trying to protect sleeping hours (e.g. from delivery noise) and decongest the traffic at the same time. The researchers involved in the NaNu! project are evaluating whether night delivery by electric commercial trucks could be the solution to the conflict.
The idea of the NaNu! project is to test the usability of an electric truck under field conditions, that means with real logistical concepts and within a regional cluster. The project is assigned to the areas of commercial transport and city-logistics.
The project’s main objective to evaluate the multiple shift operation of mid-weighted electric commercial vehicle (ECV), by making better use of less frequented periods. The aim is to achieve a greater overall economy of ECVs. To guarantee and optimize 24-hour usage of ECVs, the project will develop a battery changing and charging system and reconstruct a 12-ton electric truck. By using trucks 24-hours, load rate is almost doubled and better use is made of infrastructure by inner-city freight transport, without negatively influencing noise abatement measures.
The Institute of Transport Research of the DLR is responsible for the conception, implementation and evaluation of the accompanying research as well as the derivation of transferable knowledge. The accompanying research involves:
- Analysing the effectiveness and practicability of deliveries by electric trucks in multiple shift operation
- Surveying the acceptance of night time deliveries by customers and public
- Analysing the economic benefit for fleet operators and energy suppliers
- Analysing the energy efficiency of the electric truck in multiple shift operation compared to single shift operation
Furthermore, aspects of general regulatory conditions are considered especially regarding the night delivery via electric trucks. To realize the objectives different empirical methods are employed, including a written driver survey, interviews with residents and costumers, and accompanying observations.
Project phases:
- Specification of requirements
- Vehicle reconstruction
- Construction of the charging system and charging infrastructure
- Testing the logistical concept and night delivery
- Demonstration
- Impact analysis