{"id":8368,"date":"2021-03-02T14:17:47","date_gmt":"2021-03-02T18:17:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/?p=8368"},"modified":"2025-01-31T13:34:52","modified_gmt":"2025-01-31T18:34:52","slug":"the-postal-services-gas-guzzling-new-mail-truck-electric-versions-may-be-closer-than-they-appear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/2021\/03\/02\/the-postal-services-gas-guzzling-new-mail-truck-electric-versions-may-be-closer-than-they-appear\/","title":{"rendered":"The Postal Service\u2019s Gas-guzzling New Mail Truck: Electric Versions May Be Closer Than They Appear"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n

The sooner Congress signals\u2014with its wallet\u2014that the future NGDV is electric, the better.<\/em><\/p>\n

Clean energy advocates reacted angrily last week when the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) failed to move aggressively toward electric vehicles (EVs) in awarding the long-awaited contract for its Next Generation Delivery Vehicle (NGDV). But some objects may be closer than they appear. The USPS is not anti-EV, just broke. If Congress covers the higher upfront cost of EVs, the USPS will be able to electrify its fleet at a pace that would make the Pony Express proud.<\/p>\n

The USPS\u2019s award of the NGDV contract<\/a>, which calls for the production over ten years of 50,000 to 165,000 vehicles with \u201ceither fuel-efficient internal combustion engines or battery electric powertrains,\u201d was the culmination of a lengthy procurement process to replace the boxy, right-hand-drive mail trucks familiar to Americans. The USPS selected Oshkosh Defense, a military contractor whose prototype delivery truck reportedly featured a gasoline engine, over two competitors whose models incorporated electric powertrains.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
USPS Next Gen Delivery Vehicle<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While the award raised concerns in the clean energy community, the implementation details that the USPS subsequently revealed were a body blow. A day after the NGDV announcement\u2014and just weeks after President Biden called for electrifying the entire federal vehicle fleet\u2014Postmaster General Louis DeJoy told a congressional hearing that the USPS\u2019s current plan called for only 10 percent of the trucks purchased from Oshkosh to be electric. When asked, \u201cWhy 10 percent, why not 90 percent?,\u201d DeJoy responded, \u201cbecause we don\u2019t have the 3 or 4 extra billion dollars\u2026that it would take to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

DeJoy\u2019s response bore out the concern I raised in a February 10 commentary<\/a>, where I cautioned that \u201ceven though a postal EV would cost far less to operate and maintain, and provide substantial societal benefits from reduced carbon emissions and accelerated industry transformation, the gas guzzler\u2019s lower upfront price may be hard for the USPS to resist.\u201d EV advocates panned the USPS action, and Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA), who has led the fight to electrify the postal fleet, vowed to block<\/a> the Oshkosh contract.<\/p>\n

However, DeJoy\u2019s follow-on comments at the hearing, which received less coverage, provided grounds for hope. First, DeJoy said he would be happy to work with the Administration and Congress \u201cif they want to help us\u201d with the EV commitment. His offer was a seeming nod to the House of Representatives\u2019 2020 infrastructure bill, which cleverly authorized $6 billion for the NGDV procurement conditional on the USPS acquiring 75 percent EVs. (The Senate failed to take up the bill.)<\/p>\n

Second, DeJoy underscored that the USPS had spent $500 million to allow the vehicles to be converted from a conventional to an electric powertrain. Although details are sketchy, under the contract\u2019s initial $482 million investment, Oshkosh will finalize the design of a vehicle platform\u2014and the associated tooling and production facilities\u2014that can accommodate an electric as well as a conventional powertrain, allowing the USPS to tailor individual orders.<\/p>\n

In short, the USPS, which lost $9 billion<\/a> last year, is negotiating, not thumbing its nose at President Biden. Given the House\u2019s action last year, the USPS is doing exactly what one would expect: starting with a small (10 percent) commitment to EVs and inviting Congress and the Biden Administration to give it the money to increase the commitment.<\/p>\n

It is Congress\u2019s and the Administration\u2019s move now. Threatening to cancel the contract is counter-productive: the procurement process has taken five years, the USPS presumably followed the rules (if not, the losing bidders can challenge the result), and it desperately needs new vehicles to replace the 30-year old legacy fleet.<\/p>\n

Instead, Congress should give the USPS the upfront capital it needs to have Oshkosh produce EVs from the get-go. Such a one-time subsidy\u2014conditioned on actual EV purchases\u2014is justified given the huge environmental and innovation externalities from electrification of the giant postal fleet. Alternatively, the Administration could impose a similar condition on the $10 billion provided to the USPS in the December 2020 omnibus appropriations and stimulus bill\u2014USPS access to which remains subject to terms set by the Treasury Department (see my earlier commentary<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Congress should move quickly. It\u2019s too late to avoid the compromises in vehicle design that may be needed to accommodate multiple powertrains. It\u2019s not too late to avoid the cost of maintaining two sets of fueling facilities, parts storage, mechanics, etc. The sooner Congress signals\u2014with its wallet\u2014that the future NGDV is electric, the better.<\/p>\n

Longer term, Congress and the Administration need to reform federal procurement policy so that agencies award contracts based on life-cycle cost, not first cost. Clean energy technology typically costs more upfront and yields savings only over time, in the form of lower operating costs. Federal procurement can be a powerful tool for driving clean energy innovation\u2014in federal buildings<\/a> as well as the federal fleet<\/a>. But this will happen only if federal purchasers recognize the true costs and benefits of their decisions.<\/p>\n

Dorothy Robyn<\/a> is a Senior Fellow at the Boston University Institute for Sustainable Energy. She served as Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Installations and Environment from 2009-2012.<\/em><\/p>\n

The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the Boston University Institute for Global Sustainability.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

IGS Blog | The sooner Congress signals\u2014with its wallet\u2014that the future NGDV is electric, the better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15145,"featured_media":8376,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[418,325,276],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8368"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15145"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8368"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21282,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8368\/revisions\/21282"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/igs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}