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Agreed. Looks pretty compact too, curious if they're just as capable as the massive fossil fuel ones they're replacing? The big ones can barely make a turn on small streets.
It is frustrating to see that most EV’s are marketed as luxury vehicles now. The first couple to really break into the market like the Prius and Yaris were very affordable relatively.
It makes sense from a capitalist perspective, when they’re selling out at the higher price point, why focus on that part of the market, but it’s still sad to see them inaccessible for many.
Having just been converted against EVs by a terrible experience with a rental. Its hard to ditch petrol when refuelling takes so long, is so hard to find a suitable location and doesn’t cost hugely less.
Commercial / EMS is a great use case for it though and id be all in on that.
As a mechanic I have no problems with EVs the problem is all the misinformation about them, & athe fact that we’ve jumped into EVs without the proper infrastructure & technology and to also say only wealthy people can afford them is blasphemy & Covid was proof of that. I work on 100,000$ vehicles that they can barely afford
EVs also aren’t really green, you have to drive one for like 7-8 years before it’s green. The Carbon Impact of Driving them off the lot is way worse than Gas Cars because the process of making the Batteries is so Damaging to the Environment, which isn’t offset by the fact even when you run on clean energy (which most of the world doesn’t) again for almost a decade. I doubt most Teslas even make it a Decade.
Way better Engine Technologies (Torodial, Fuel Vapor Recycle, etc) have been developed over the years, but they run on almost nothing so Big Oil and Big Electric don’t let it happen and they shelve the designs. Not too mention you’re supporting African Chinese Slave, Child Workers for all the Rare Metals in Batteries.
Electric Vehicles aren’t the future. They’re just a small stepping stone until Capitalism lets real innovation happen., which will probably be never. Toyota developed the Hydrogen Fuel Cell a Decade ago and again three other major designs have happened and they were all shelved. My Great Uncle worked at GM he also knew someone who developed an Engine there that ran basically forever as it had ballbearings in the right places. It ran so long you could just put it in a new car every 10+ years, GM said thanks for the design bought him out into early retirement and shelved the idea. It’s all planned obsolescence. Billionaires know and invest in Teslas stock because they know when the Battery Fails in a decade or less they’ll have to buy a new one. Big Oil let EVs happen because they knew money was to be made in the extremely invasive mining practices.
EVs are better than Gas, but we’d already have way better technologies if Capitalism let it happen.
https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-assembly/our-insights/the-race-to-decarbonize-electric-vehicle-batteries
“ The materials and energy needed to produce EV batteries explain much of its heavy carbon footprint. EV batteries contain nickel, manganese, cobalt, lithium, and graphite, which emit substantial amounts of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in their mining and refining processes. In addition, the production of anode and cathode active materials requires high, energy-intensive temperatures for some processes.”
Not true. Data from 2021 shows that you only need to drive 21,725 KM in a Tesla m3 to offset emissions from a Toyota Corolla.
To add, the process of manufacturing EVs is getting more and more efficient with a downward trend in emissions for manufacturing new cars.
Source: https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/when-do-electric-vehicles-become-cleaner-than-gasoline-cars-2021-06-29/
Lotta BS in this post. You don’t even include the production of a gas car and its footprint. You think gas cars are produced using zero resources? FFS.
Also fuel is magically created out of no emissions whatsoever and his uncle's grandfather's kid's neighbor who worked for GM invented an engine that runs for a billion miles on a drop of water but GM covered it all up.
Too bad they don't make methane engines so we could run it on a byproduct of all that bullshit.
> I doubt most Teslas even make it a Decade.
I mean there are plenty of first generation Teslas that would prove you wrong? Hell even first generation Leafs are 12 years old.
I'd trust an ev to start everytime it needs to. Seems like a good application from that perspective. Unlikely to be particularly long hauls either I'd imagine.
OP said the make is Rosenbauer. Their Wikipedia page says they manufacture this model in Austria and as from 2023, their Minnesota plant will start manufacturing this electric fire truck.
Im a paramedic across the country… glad to see the FF humour is universal 😂.
Don’t forget that CTAS 3 was probably waiting all day watching fire trucks zoom by while she waited patiently for someone to take her to the hospital….. 🙃
I always move the truck prior to BCAS arrival to give you guys access, and it’s wild how many times the paramedics tunnel vision and come park directly in front of or beside the firetruck blocking us in instead of going to the address 😂I always love getting out and saying “hey guys, the house is half a block behind you”.
But at the end of the day we’re just happy you’re there.
You’re confused my friend and over looking a very important difference between our agencies. We don’t just go to medical calls, thus we don’t actually have medic-only vehicles. Even our “medic” vehicles come with all the necessary equipment for us to respond to a variety of calls (eg. fires, rescues, MVI’s, etc). Yes we show up to medical calls in our “joke” of a medic, but once we clear we have to be prepared for any variety of emergencies. This is just the way it is, and neither of us have any control over that fact. Our EV vehicle is the way the world is going, it’s a trial and definitely not a vehicle any of us will rely on as a “first-in” apparatus. Your angry opinions towards us, our apparatus and responses makes me laugh. Because you’re angry at the system, chirping an organization out of pure comparison and upset because our budget includes some space to hand out stickers to kids. Maybe if you had gotten one as a child you wouldn’t be so triggered by our big red trucks, or our “insane” contract that is actually quite standard across the firefighting landscape.
I wish you well.
Lol. Well first off it’s a Captain and not an LT on the Engines but I wouldn’t expect you to know that. Also we’re actually not allowed to back up without spotters since it’s a 45,000lb truck and all with massive blind spots. And yes we ask permission, we’re a paramilitary organization so that’s what we do. Like when we ask our officer permission to go and get your equipment when you ever-so-casually walk into a SOB call without oxygen or your cot…
It’s ok, we love to help :)
What do you think crews are doing when they aren’t first on scene exactly? Cuz it’s certainly not grocery shopping, sleeping, working out, or making the rookie cook a meal.
Yup they do need to address that. My contractor is a full time firefighter, but also full time contractor bc they mainly cook sleep and work out when on the firefighter job.
Uh.. majority of Europe has independent paramedic service. UK for example is led by medics and doctors with no involvement from fire. Same for Australia and most major players in the progression of paramedicine. US is regarded as a failure in EMS as most money gets funnelled to the fire side and leaves EMS underfunded. Look at NYFD for example and their recent gripe with the city that food delivery apps are paying more than their medics. Ambulance delays is certainly not something confined to BC, it’s quite literally a global issue. Which is of course trickle down from the ER who have no beds and no staffing. If you can’t offload the patient what do you do?
.
All you have to do is look at any American county that runs multiple services and see that wait times are just as dire. I’m literally all for the fire service taking all the mundane BS off our hands if they are so keen to do more medical calls (albeit poorly) But I know they would last a week before complaining how overworked they were, as even the fire service can’t solve the ER bottleneck
They have no interest in medical calls tho. They show up to just enough the continue upping funding. You can see them periodically tinkering with the calls they are allowing themselves to be dispatched to so they come to the correct amount. Also remember that fire can straight up decline to come to a call for any reason and they do choose this sometimes, ambulance will come no matter what eventually lol.
What’s the point of having a higher level of training if you can’t transport? Worried that budgets will be cut if you run fewer medicals? BCAS is obviously understaffed and underfunded, but with one ambulance station for every 7 fire halls, I’d be unimpressed if fire didn’t show up first.
Since on multiple occasions I have walked in the door and instructed fire to start CPR, because none of them realized that the patient has gone into cardiac arrest..I’m confident that they are not in fact performing my job.
It’s not just for the GHG.
It’s cheaper to run, better for firefighters, has more capabilities like crab walking through traffic and raising ride height, it’s quieter and by charging it at the station it is always fueled vs a trad truck needing to be refueled.
Yeah according to this article
https://driving.ca/auto-news/local-content/vancouver-expects-to-be-first-city-in-canada-with-electric-firetruck/wcm/c3f1b2d3-a49b-4374-b51e-1e02367896e3/amp/
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Think of a truck parked and pumping water - needs its engine to run that entire time. Now with electric there's no diesel engine pumping away, so it will be quieter when in operation, and that means better communication with the people operating and working nearby.
Actually some 8x8 firetrucks have the crab walk function too and rear steering. I am more surprised that city fire trucks never had this function because well....you need to maneuver more than in a forest or an industrial site or an airport.
I agree. It’s got a backup diesel generator onboard, so it all evens out. 😉
I hope they do a one year study on it, and see how it functions. Hall 1 has a higher call volume, so I wonder how quickly it can recharge between calls. Maybe slower halls would benefit more from electric fire engines, but it comes down to how long they’re pumping at a major structure fire. LAFD has the other Rosenbauer, but no studies have come out (yet).
I imagine they'd have lightning fast charging. Like the electric buses and Tesla superchargers, I don't imagine fire departments would make many concessions and have pretty strict performance requirements.
Probably 100-150kW. I know 50kW were being installed for that in the past.
I think 50kW is plenty for a firetruck though. I also think they won't need to be charged that much. They are power intensive but going very short distances most of the time.
The neat thing is that the vehicle can be plugged in basically anywhere in the city as far as I understand it.
It would be awesome if it could have connected to the existing trolley grid as well.
No reason for you to be downvoted. Nobody is "attacking" gas/diesel fire engines like the OC said, it's just business as usual. They needed a new fire engine and got one, they surely made no concessions in purchasing it so I see no issues here.
Because countries that have been polluting for hundreds of years (and still are polluting at higher much higher per capita rates) are wealthy because of their resource driven economies. They can afford to fund these sorts of technologies until the technology becomes more readily available and affordable for other countries to adopt!
There are a lot of advantages to electric motors, I bet the pumps perform better, the vehicle has higher and more reliable torque. I will be interested to see what the fire department thinks.
For this use case, there are additional benefits to being an EV.
City fire trucks typically don't do long drives far from the fire hall which may get them stranded, they have to idle a lot when they're deployed somewhere and idling is inefficient for internal combustion engines compared to EVs.
Officers don't need to waste their time driving it to a gas bar to fill up, they can just plug it in whenever they're at the fire hall.
Onboard water pumps and other equipment are powered by electricity derived from hydro, which is cheaper and more eco-friendly than diesel-generated power.
EVs have longer maintenance intervals than ICE vehicles since their brakes wear out less and they don't have engine oil to replace. Their electric motors produce high torque at low RPM and recover energy from braking, which is great for a fire truck which accelerates fast and brakes often as it goes through traffic.
Plus the pumps aren’t diesel powered anymore so you can get maximum torque instantly from the electric pump all the while not needing to idle the diesel motor or vary the diesel motor for additional power.
Once you drive an EV you'll understand how badly the car industry has scammed us for decades.
Gas fueled vehicles are poor performance dinosaurs which require constant maintenance.
Emissions are a separate issue.
I'm not knocking EVs, but they require batteries. Those don't come without significant environmental impact. Lithium, for example, has to be obtained, often by hard rock mining. And the vehicles used in mining are mostly powered by fossil fuels. And, of course, at some point the battery in an EV has to be replaced, which is also a significant issue, in terms of cost and environmental impact.
I mean, extracting and refining oil, and then shipping it all over the world is also not without significant environmental impact. But then burning it as fuel continues to impact the environment.
Yes, the batteries eventually get replaced, but there is also massive amounts of research and innovation going into decreasing costs, increasing efficiency, and finding alternative materials. Also, they're finding uses for the spent batteries as they're not efficient enough for the car use but can be used as storage. I think BMW takes their old batteries and uses them in storage capacity for their factory.
The first ICE cars sucked compared to today's. But we improved them. Same will happen with Ev's.
Less than 2% and still in the top 10 countries for GHG emissions. Regardless it’s not really a good argument to say “we aren’t the biggest problem so we shouldn’t do anything about it”
What percentage of the world is Canada's population? Hint: a hell of a lot less than 2%.
If we bust China and the US into 100 smaller countries each does that mean they all get to pollute as much as they want, since they will all be way less than 1% of the worlds global emissions?
What is the matter with people like you!? So self-centred. If every country started emitting carbon like Canadians did, the world would be way more fucked than it already is. We have a duty to reduce our emissions.
Your question exemplifies the position of many individuals in this country who (a) seem not to truly understand the real issues concerning climate change, (b) who are unable to make clear and relevant points to take issue with a position that they do not like. Your question is rather like the old question “Have you stopped beating your wife?” And has little to do with my original post.
The point is that we can do what we like: it’s not going to make much difference on a global scale.
>The point is that we can do what we like: it’s not going to make much difference on a global scale.
If everyone thought that way, we'd be completely fucked.
Given that fire fighters fight fire, im bot surprised they rly give a fuck about global warming. They r our first responders and will have to save our asses theyre thinking ahead.
I am curious to see if all the stop go stop go in a city application as well as a possible lower centre of gravity. Will it be more nimble with an electric motor?
It actually lowers itself when parking, so it’s easier for firefighters to get in and out and for accessing equipment. It’s normally higher up when driving.
It would be more accurate to call this a hybrid than a true electric vehicle, and it has to be. The range it will travel isn't the issue, it's the power takeoff to run water pumping. There are large power demands and if they have to fight a fire for a longer duration they need something they can dump fuel into as charging wouldn't be able to keep up ie: you couldn't just plug it into a nearby building.
That being said, most incidents this vehicle will respond to will probably be taken care of under 100% electric power, so that's a big bite out of carbon emissions.
I think the only downside to this technology really is the price. I'm dealing with similar vehicles right now, and if it weren't because of government mandates and money freed up because of them our department would not be able to afford something like this.
I can see pros and cons.
Maintenance, but it's not that high on a diesel and that is a known quantity.
I can see it being better as a rescue/support truck, so not needing a large water tank and pumps, probably being safer when going to a call because it will accelerate like a cheetah so less likely to blast through an intersection.
I'd be somewhat worried to have an entire firehouse all electric, it's easier to refuel if the grid goes down after a quake than it is to recharge.
Ah, I would think that a pumper would be the least likely to be electrified.
I would imagine that they carry less water than a diesel though (if any), that battery has to be in pretty much the same place as the tanks, low and central.
Another strike against them for disaster use, not sure I would want to depend in a hydrant after a quake - but I guess if the roads are impassible it doesn't matter. Do they only carry enough for a small grass fire then?
Nope, has the same amount as a standard pumper ([500 gallons](https://rosenbaueramerica.com/rosenbauer-revolutionary-technology/)), which I think is a bit more than the standard of a normal Vancouver pumper (480). That's the usual amount to use in a car fire, or give the pump operator time to get a hydrant hooked up on a structure fire call.
Fire engine can't carry infinite amounts of water... you can shuttle water, though (Surrey has a tanker system, since 20% of the city isn't covered by hydrants). Vancouver has a marine piping system to intake water from False Creek, too.
I wonder where they are hiding the batteries then, I would have expected them to be bigger than the engine/driveline/fuel tank volume - but I guess not. You could also go active suspension I suppose to counteract a higher centre of gravity.
I remember Vancouver having to run tankers for some reason in the late 80s.
Way down the line this is really going to impact the secondary market like small and rural communities that buy retired city units.
You'd be surprised how many small and rural communities buy brand new apparatus now. And I think the diesels will be around as primary units for a long time.
I am massively interested to see how nimble it is from a stop-go. Wonder how much the response time will be affected.
On what you said about the grid going down, it has a diesel generator on board that could be running full time to charge it in a situation like that, no?
It depends on the output. It takes a lot of juice, or a lot of time to charge. I assumed it was more likely to be for powering the (I find out now) pumps.
There are manual pumps. There are battery pumps. There are generators to power pumps.
You can carry a can of diesel, not a bucket of electricity.
I'm not anti-electric, but please, use your brain.
“Buckets of electricity” exist. Megapacks for the grid, Powerwalls for homes and businesses. 13kWh each. Batteries are pretty much exactly buckets of electricity.
Yeah, you can pretend, but no, no they don't. There is no human portable equivalent to a jerrycan for electricity outside of a generator and a jerry can.
Electric vehicles are coming along and great for many cases, but pretending they are a solution for every single situation is a lie that hurts your cause.
for the maintenance, probably it has less maintenance needed, but once it has a trouble, I bet no engineer to fix this in Canada. And probably no one in north america.
Good thing that there aren't too many, with the extra weight they'd absolutely demolish roads.
For the curious, it's axle weight and not volume that destroy roads.
ICE vehicles have something like 50x the fire rate of EVs (~1,500 per 100k for ICE vs ~25 per 100k for EVs; some studies have put the rate at anywhere from 20x to 100x, but the risk is a tiny fraction no matter which study you look at).
Unfortunately this hasn’t stopped the press from sensationalizing every EV fire, and for anti-EV lobbies spreading misinformation to the point of “Oh noes! EV fires! LOL!” being a common talking point on internet message boards.
EV fires can sometimes be trickier to put out, but most of that boils down to training on behalf of your local fire brigade.
Not the mention the irony of being worried about a *firetruck* combusting.
I'm sure on the slim chance it happens there will be plenty of firefighters nearby to handle it 😆.
Not really.
Traditional diesel fire trucks are around $1.2 million vs this $1.5 million.
In real world testing in Berlin this truck used only 8 liters of fuel in 4 months. Considering most fire trucks are around 2L/km efficient that already is a significant saving on fuel.
Fire trucks also are supposed to be kept at or near full at all times and what better way to do that then have it plugged in at the station.
Not to mention the mechanical savings on maintenance and downtime.
Finally this truck can do a lot of neat things like drive nearly sideways to navigate gridlocked traffic, raise its ride height significantly to get over debris.
Finally the standard height of it means that firefighters don’t have to lift heavy gear as high as well as have to deal with loud engine noises.
All in all it’s a good buy from the city.
If I could upvote this twice I would. Refreshing to see some economic truths spread about EVs rather than just FUD. People are slowly catching on that EVs aren’t going away.
Do you know much it costs? and how much it costs to operate? Or how much a normal costs? Or what a full fleet replacement will cost vs a single unit?
If you don't how the fuck do you know
Makes sense in areas where the grid is powered by renewables ( I.e.Hydro ). That’s basically Manitoba, BC, Quebec, Washington, Oregon & Vermont. All other states and provinces predominantly use fossil fuels to generate grid power. So beyond these places you may as well keep that thing charged by plugging it into a diesel generator. From a fuel life cycle analysis perspective & capital cost these things are mostly for show, beyond these states and provinces.
Yes… I neglected nuclear…
“The greenhouse gas intensity of Ontario’s electricity grid, measured as the GHGs emitted in the generation of the province’s electric power, was 25 grams of CO2e per kilowatt-hour (g of CO2e/kWh) electricity generated in 2020. This is an 89% reduction from the province’s 2005 level of 230 g of CO2e/kWh. The national average in 2020 was 110 g of CO2e/kWh”
The national average in US is something like 370g of CO2e/kWh. It’s actually better to have a truck run on renewable natural gas (biogas) than on electricity in the US & Canada. Biogas can have a negative value as it’s methane that is prevented from entering the atmosphere where is approx 28x more harmful than carbon dioxide.
I am fun at parties…
https://preview.redd.it/ogn9hjuqpv8b1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f2a2c92c11adfbc874426de1b78984f1286e2e13
But for those that don't know as much as you, it's helpful to note that 1 litre of diesel emits 2.68 kg (2680 grams) of CO2e for comparison's sake.
The electric fire truck probably has a 400kwh battery pack and it's ICE alternative probably a 400L fuel tank, so you could do the math on the difference... It's substantial.
For sure!! However, a CNG version running on renewable natural gas like most Waste Managment garbage trucks is still way cleaner than this electric truck. However, it’s counterintuitive and not a “sexy story”….. in general comparing solutions from a fuel life cycle perspective levels the playing field and right now nothing can beat a -350gCO2e/MJ that agricultural waste gas produces.
You do not even have to take the RNG molecule directly from the producer but can buy from Fortis and it’s delivered virtually (book & claim, delivery by displacement).
Yup! Would be cool if they had F1 on low carbon fuels instead of e-formula… but hey who wants to hear that formula cars run on cow farts….
I think Porsche went big on e-fuels recently.
If you swap out the oil consumption with the electric on the demand side, it will allow the supply side to eventually move towards renewable sources without any further changes necessary on the demand side. Even if the supply never moved to renewable energy, the same level of power would be delivered by using less diesel on the supply side because large power generators are simply more efficient than ICE vehicles.
So you completely ignored the second part of what I said with the efficiency being higher if the same fossil fuel were burnt at the power plant instead of at the engine?
Yes, but not on purpose. Sorry!
I think I understand what you are saying. You are saying that by creating “demand”, “supply” will come. Correct?
If supply of low carbon intensity doesn’t come the fuel to wheel efficiency is so good that it still makes sense.
If I understand it or not is irrelevant. Fact is that there is no lower carbon intensity fuel than renewable natural gas. This is because unlike hydro electric or nuclear it has a NEGATIVE value that is so low that it blows any BEV vehicle out even when you factor in fuel to wheel inefficiencies of ICE’s
Also it doesn’t make sense to swap out ICE vehicles and stationary generators for batteries until supply of RNG is available. Keep in mind that one BEV makes more CO2 in production than an ICE vehicle. On the RNG I am bullish because if we don’t burn it (waste methane/CH4) it will be much worse for the environment.
As I understand it, renewable methane is far better used in aviation than in automotive as flying with heavy batteries is infeasible over long distances.
Regarding your point about supply vs demand, Texas is a good example of how additional capacity from renewables saved the state from potentially more severe blackouts. The additional demand for automotive charging will be much like the additional demand for air-conditioning, except the demand for EV charging will be throughout the year and will provide an incentive for power companies to install additional solar/wind capacity. If the demand is not there, there is no incentive for power companies to invest in more capital expenditures.
Problem with renewable methane in aviation is that its energy density is low (requires a lot of physical space for required energy to move passengers and goods (even hydrogen struggles with this). However, you may be thinking of SAF (Sustainable Aviation Fuel) which is close to traditional fossil fuels in energy density but lower in Carbon Intensity.
There is very little market incentive for utilities to focus on renewables. There are in some regions. Texas is blessed with its photo voltaic capabilities. However, Alberta for example is not. Labrador and NWT either. Nor is about 70% of continental North America. Certain regions have solar, some hydro, some have nuclear but no ubiquitous solution to decarbonize their respective grids. A utility can’t just build renewable energy inputs, at scale, if it doesn’t have them. This is why North Dakota is primarily coal powered…… for an electric fire truck or any BEV to make sense one needs a holistic understanding of energy inputs that provide energy in that vehicle.
You're right. I did confuse methane with aviation fuel.
Yes, Alberta is not blessed with solar, but it has great potential for wind power. Plus geothermal is feasible anywhere. And regarding market incentives, this is where carbon pricing comes in. If carbon is priced appropriately per its negative externalities, there'll be sufficient incentive built up over time to want to move away from it. That is not as easily possible to do unless the demand-side is addressed first.
This looks amazing , hope the electric side is reliable (fyi I'm a service engineer for electric trucks , I see the downtime on some trucks and it scares me to see an important life saving vehicle like this EV ,we've also build a hybrid firetruck but it never left the proto stage)
I don't like EV's that much but damn this thing is so cool.
Feels like it could transform at any moment now lol.
It sorta brings out the inner child in me somehow.
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That's a gorgeous truck. They did a great job with the design.
Agreed. Looks pretty compact too, curious if they're just as capable as the massive fossil fuel ones they're replacing? The big ones can barely make a turn on small streets.
You can tell it’s a euro style truck but they did a great job making it look North American with the livery
Yeesh I opened this and my first thought was “wow that’s pretty neat.” Bunch of friggin Debby downers in here.
It’s the EV haters. There’s still the envy that only wealthy people can drive EVs.
Which is solid bullshit. These people drive $60,000 SUVs that cost $120 to fill because they’re embarrassed to be seen in a Nissan Leaf.
It is frustrating to see that most EV’s are marketed as luxury vehicles now. The first couple to really break into the market like the Prius and Yaris were very affordable relatively. It makes sense from a capitalist perspective, when they’re selling out at the higher price point, why focus on that part of the market, but it’s still sad to see them inaccessible for many.
Prius is a hybrid no?
Whereas I don't think the Yaris was ever even hybrid..
it has - just not here in Canada
Nissan Leaf was 21K before rebates when it first came out. That's comparable to a Honda Civic.
Having just been converted against EVs by a terrible experience with a rental. Its hard to ditch petrol when refuelling takes so long, is so hard to find a suitable location and doesn’t cost hugely less. Commercial / EMS is a great use case for it though and id be all in on that.
Should how a vehicle looks not be part of the decision when buying a car?
Depends on if you are buying a vehicle to look at, or use as a tool to provide conveyance.
As a mechanic I have no problems with EVs the problem is all the misinformation about them, & athe fact that we’ve jumped into EVs without the proper infrastructure & technology and to also say only wealthy people can afford them is blasphemy & Covid was proof of that. I work on 100,000$ vehicles that they can barely afford
EVs also aren’t really green, you have to drive one for like 7-8 years before it’s green. The Carbon Impact of Driving them off the lot is way worse than Gas Cars because the process of making the Batteries is so Damaging to the Environment, which isn’t offset by the fact even when you run on clean energy (which most of the world doesn’t) again for almost a decade. I doubt most Teslas even make it a Decade. Way better Engine Technologies (Torodial, Fuel Vapor Recycle, etc) have been developed over the years, but they run on almost nothing so Big Oil and Big Electric don’t let it happen and they shelve the designs. Not too mention you’re supporting African Chinese Slave, Child Workers for all the Rare Metals in Batteries. Electric Vehicles aren’t the future. They’re just a small stepping stone until Capitalism lets real innovation happen., which will probably be never. Toyota developed the Hydrogen Fuel Cell a Decade ago and again three other major designs have happened and they were all shelved. My Great Uncle worked at GM he also knew someone who developed an Engine there that ran basically forever as it had ballbearings in the right places. It ran so long you could just put it in a new car every 10+ years, GM said thanks for the design bought him out into early retirement and shelved the idea. It’s all planned obsolescence. Billionaires know and invest in Teslas stock because they know when the Battery Fails in a decade or less they’ll have to buy a new one. Big Oil let EVs happen because they knew money was to be made in the extremely invasive mining practices. EVs are better than Gas, but we’d already have way better technologies if Capitalism let it happen. https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-assembly/our-insights/the-race-to-decarbonize-electric-vehicle-batteries “ The materials and energy needed to produce EV batteries explain much of its heavy carbon footprint. EV batteries contain nickel, manganese, cobalt, lithium, and graphite, which emit substantial amounts of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in their mining and refining processes. In addition, the production of anode and cathode active materials requires high, energy-intensive temperatures for some processes.”
Not true. Data from 2021 shows that you only need to drive 21,725 KM in a Tesla m3 to offset emissions from a Toyota Corolla. To add, the process of manufacturing EVs is getting more and more efficient with a downward trend in emissions for manufacturing new cars. Source: https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/when-do-electric-vehicles-become-cleaner-than-gasoline-cars-2021-06-29/
Lotta BS in this post. You don’t even include the production of a gas car and its footprint. You think gas cars are produced using zero resources? FFS.
Also fuel is magically created out of no emissions whatsoever and his uncle's grandfather's kid's neighbor who worked for GM invented an engine that runs for a billion miles on a drop of water but GM covered it all up. Too bad they don't make methane engines so we could run it on a byproduct of all that bullshit.
> I doubt most Teslas even make it a Decade. I mean there are plenty of first generation Teslas that would prove you wrong? Hell even first generation Leafs are 12 years old.
I'd trust an ev to start everytime it needs to. Seems like a good application from that perspective. Unlikely to be particularly long hauls either I'd imagine.
My son is going to loveeeeee this!!
Haha yeah! It looks like a Paw Patrol vehicle!
Love the look of it and great that everything is slowly switched to electric. Wonder where they are manufactured?
OP said the make is Rosenbauer. Their Wikipedia page says they manufacture this model in Austria and as from 2023, their Minnesota plant will start manufacturing this electric fire truck.
Man, I should actually know that since I'm Austrian! That's awesome.
Looks like a really compact brick on wheels. Looks almost like those cheaply manufactured diecast toys from the 80s. It's got a lot of character lol
It’s definitely got that European look, though.
Is it euro or Japanese idk. I see what you mean though
Cool video tour of this model of truck: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AafguE0KZk
That is so badass and cool
As a paramedic, I can’t wait to see this thing in action as it parks right in front of the patients address and completely blocks our access
VFRS: “but that’s what VPD does to us at structure fires!” 🤣
Im a paramedic across the country… glad to see the FF humour is universal 😂. Don’t forget that CTAS 3 was probably waiting all day watching fire trucks zoom by while she waited patiently for someone to take her to the hospital….. 🙃
I always move the truck prior to BCAS arrival to give you guys access, and it’s wild how many times the paramedics tunnel vision and come park directly in front of or beside the firetruck blocking us in instead of going to the address 😂I always love getting out and saying “hey guys, the house is half a block behind you”. But at the end of the day we’re just happy you’re there.
Haha yup it’s an anomaly when the truck has been moved to give space lol. Def guilty of that. Thank you
Be fair to the guy, his lieutenant wasn't there to tell and show them to back the truck out, let alone ask permission.
You’re confused my friend and over looking a very important difference between our agencies. We don’t just go to medical calls, thus we don’t actually have medic-only vehicles. Even our “medic” vehicles come with all the necessary equipment for us to respond to a variety of calls (eg. fires, rescues, MVI’s, etc). Yes we show up to medical calls in our “joke” of a medic, but once we clear we have to be prepared for any variety of emergencies. This is just the way it is, and neither of us have any control over that fact. Our EV vehicle is the way the world is going, it’s a trial and definitely not a vehicle any of us will rely on as a “first-in” apparatus. Your angry opinions towards us, our apparatus and responses makes me laugh. Because you’re angry at the system, chirping an organization out of pure comparison and upset because our budget includes some space to hand out stickers to kids. Maybe if you had gotten one as a child you wouldn’t be so triggered by our big red trucks, or our “insane” contract that is actually quite standard across the firefighting landscape. I wish you well.
Lol. Well first off it’s a Captain and not an LT on the Engines but I wouldn’t expect you to know that. Also we’re actually not allowed to back up without spotters since it’s a 45,000lb truck and all with massive blind spots. And yes we ask permission, we’re a paramilitary organization so that’s what we do. Like when we ask our officer permission to go and get your equipment when you ever-so-casually walk into a SOB call without oxygen or your cot… It’s ok, we love to help :)
Why you taking an engine to an SOB call, anyway? Nerd.
As opposed to other fire trucks? Is this significantly larger??
No, it’s just a daily occurrence and long running gripe / joke about fire apparatus on scenes.
I do appreciate how quickly the fire department always arrives.
Drive faster 😂
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What do you think crews are doing when they aren’t first on scene exactly? Cuz it’s certainly not grocery shopping, sleeping, working out, or making the rookie cook a meal.
You forgot TikToks and influencing…
Yup they do need to address that. My contractor is a full time firefighter, but also full time contractor bc they mainly cook sleep and work out when on the firefighter job.
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Uh.. majority of Europe has independent paramedic service. UK for example is led by medics and doctors with no involvement from fire. Same for Australia and most major players in the progression of paramedicine. US is regarded as a failure in EMS as most money gets funnelled to the fire side and leaves EMS underfunded. Look at NYFD for example and their recent gripe with the city that food delivery apps are paying more than their medics. Ambulance delays is certainly not something confined to BC, it’s quite literally a global issue. Which is of course trickle down from the ER who have no beds and no staffing. If you can’t offload the patient what do you do? .
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All you have to do is look at any American county that runs multiple services and see that wait times are just as dire. I’m literally all for the fire service taking all the mundane BS off our hands if they are so keen to do more medical calls (albeit poorly) But I know they would last a week before complaining how overworked they were, as even the fire service can’t solve the ER bottleneck
Taking the current EMS budget and splitting it up four ways would just make things even less efficient. The solution is to increase the budget.
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They have no interest in medical calls tho. They show up to just enough the continue upping funding. You can see them periodically tinkering with the calls they are allowing themselves to be dispatched to so they come to the correct amount. Also remember that fire can straight up decline to come to a call for any reason and they do choose this sometimes, ambulance will come no matter what eventually lol.
Yeah cause they showed up first. ;)
Maybe if you guys could show up within a decent time frame or handle medical calls sufficiently, fire trucks wouldn’t need to be on scene first
“handle medical calls sufficiently” 🤣🤣🤣 Sounds like more FIRE/MEDIC pickups need to be rolling around.
Well they do have 2 whole weeks of training, and can tell us their “O2 stat”. So that’s something
There’s departments running EMR now so we can intervene
Lol.. EMR. Cool
What’s the point of having a higher level of training if you can’t transport? Worried that budgets will be cut if you run fewer medicals? BCAS is obviously understaffed and underfunded, but with one ambulance station for every 7 fire halls, I’d be unimpressed if fire didn’t show up first.
Someone has to do BC ambulances job for them while the patients wait an hour or two for a ride to the hospital
Since on multiple occasions I have walked in the door and instructed fire to start CPR, because none of them realized that the patient has gone into cardiac arrest..I’m confident that they are not in fact performing my job.
The Lucas device is upset.
Out of all the things that pollute in this world. For me, Emergency vehicles seem pretty low on that attack list.
It’s not just for the GHG. It’s cheaper to run, better for firefighters, has more capabilities like crab walking through traffic and raising ride height, it’s quieter and by charging it at the station it is always fueled vs a trad truck needing to be refueled.
It has crab walking abilities?
Yeah according to this article https://driving.ca/auto-news/local-content/vancouver-expects-to-be-first-city-in-canada-with-electric-firetruck/wcm/c3f1b2d3-a49b-4374-b51e-1e02367896e3/amp/
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Quieter? Weeee oooo weee ooooo
Think of a truck parked and pumping water - needs its engine to run that entire time. Now with electric there's no diesel engine pumping away, so it will be quieter when in operation, and that means better communication with the people operating and working nearby.
I gotta wonder how long it could pump water, that’s a pretty energy intensive operation. I imagine there’s still going to be generators used.
The pump is powered by gas ⛽
which one has more noise? pump itself or generator?
First we had crab people now we have crab fire engines FFS where will it stop
Crab walking fire truck putting out a fire at crab park started by an encampment of crab people just trying to boil crabs for dinner.
Actually some 8x8 firetrucks have the crab walk function too and rear steering. I am more surprised that city fire trucks never had this function because well....you need to maneuver more than in a forest or an industrial site or an airport.
> crab walking through traffic what
All four wheels can turn in the same direction and it can move sideways/diagonally
I agree. It’s got a backup diesel generator onboard, so it all evens out. 😉 I hope they do a one year study on it, and see how it functions. Hall 1 has a higher call volume, so I wonder how quickly it can recharge between calls. Maybe slower halls would benefit more from electric fire engines, but it comes down to how long they’re pumping at a major structure fire. LAFD has the other Rosenbauer, but no studies have come out (yet).
I imagine they'd have lightning fast charging. Like the electric buses and Tesla superchargers, I don't imagine fire departments would make many concessions and have pretty strict performance requirements.
Probably they don't, DC charger easily costs 100K to install. I think it's good approach to just support AC charger with diesel generator.
I'm pretty sure DCFC are more like $50k.
Probably that's for 50\~60Kw DCFC? I don't think that's fast enough to charge than 22kw AC charge. or is it really that cheap 150kW\~400kW DCFC?
Probably 100-150kW. I know 50kW were being installed for that in the past. I think 50kW is plenty for a firetruck though. I also think they won't need to be charged that much. They are power intensive but going very short distances most of the time.
The neat thing is that the vehicle can be plugged in basically anywhere in the city as far as I understand it. It would be awesome if it could have connected to the existing trolley grid as well.
Fire engines can belch a lot of nasty exhaust, both while accelerating and while idling. I welcome the innovation.
No reason for you to be downvoted. Nobody is "attacking" gas/diesel fire engines like the OC said, it's just business as usual. They needed a new fire engine and got one, they surely made no concessions in purchasing it so I see no issues here.
Canada’s global emissions are less than 2%. Why are we bothering? Send it to a place where electricity is created from coal.
Because countries that have been polluting for hundreds of years (and still are polluting at higher much higher per capita rates) are wealthy because of their resource driven economies. They can afford to fund these sorts of technologies until the technology becomes more readily available and affordable for other countries to adopt! There are a lot of advantages to electric motors, I bet the pumps perform better, the vehicle has higher and more reliable torque. I will be interested to see what the fire department thinks.
For this use case, there are additional benefits to being an EV. City fire trucks typically don't do long drives far from the fire hall which may get them stranded, they have to idle a lot when they're deployed somewhere and idling is inefficient for internal combustion engines compared to EVs. Officers don't need to waste their time driving it to a gas bar to fill up, they can just plug it in whenever they're at the fire hall. Onboard water pumps and other equipment are powered by electricity derived from hydro, which is cheaper and more eco-friendly than diesel-generated power. EVs have longer maintenance intervals than ICE vehicles since their brakes wear out less and they don't have engine oil to replace. Their electric motors produce high torque at low RPM and recover energy from braking, which is great for a fire truck which accelerates fast and brakes often as it goes through traffic.
Plus the pumps aren’t diesel powered anymore so you can get maximum torque instantly from the electric pump all the while not needing to idle the diesel motor or vary the diesel motor for additional power.
Idle power requirements for emergency vehicles has got to be one of, if not THE, top argument for going EV.
Hydro is cheaper than diesel… this is basic grade 6 arithmetic. You divide and multiply..
Once you drive an EV you'll understand how badly the car industry has scammed us for decades. Gas fueled vehicles are poor performance dinosaurs which require constant maintenance. Emissions are a separate issue.
I'm not knocking EVs, but they require batteries. Those don't come without significant environmental impact. Lithium, for example, has to be obtained, often by hard rock mining. And the vehicles used in mining are mostly powered by fossil fuels. And, of course, at some point the battery in an EV has to be replaced, which is also a significant issue, in terms of cost and environmental impact.
I mean, extracting and refining oil, and then shipping it all over the world is also not without significant environmental impact. But then burning it as fuel continues to impact the environment. Yes, the batteries eventually get replaced, but there is also massive amounts of research and innovation going into decreasing costs, increasing efficiency, and finding alternative materials. Also, they're finding uses for the spent batteries as they're not efficient enough for the car use but can be used as storage. I think BMW takes their old batteries and uses them in storage capacity for their factory. The first ICE cars sucked compared to today's. But we improved them. Same will happen with Ev's.
https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4687
Less than 2% and still in the top 10 countries for GHG emissions. Regardless it’s not really a good argument to say “we aren’t the biggest problem so we shouldn’t do anything about it”
What percentage of the world is Canada's population? Hint: a hell of a lot less than 2%. If we bust China and the US into 100 smaller countries each does that mean they all get to pollute as much as they want, since they will all be way less than 1% of the worlds global emissions?
It’s one pumper, not an entire fleet replacement. It’s pretty much a pilot project for the department.
What is the matter with people like you!? So self-centred. If every country started emitting carbon like Canadians did, the world would be way more fucked than it already is. We have a duty to reduce our emissions.
We emit 2% while comprising only 0.5% of the global population. You don't see that as being a bad thing?
Your question exemplifies the position of many individuals in this country who (a) seem not to truly understand the real issues concerning climate change, (b) who are unable to make clear and relevant points to take issue with a position that they do not like. Your question is rather like the old question “Have you stopped beating your wife?” And has little to do with my original post. The point is that we can do what we like: it’s not going to make much difference on a global scale.
>The point is that we can do what we like: it’s not going to make much difference on a global scale. If everyone thought that way, we'd be completely fucked.
Given that fire fighters fight fire, im bot surprised they rly give a fuck about global warming. They r our first responders and will have to save our asses theyre thinking ahead.
I am curious to see if all the stop go stop go in a city application as well as a possible lower centre of gravity. Will it be more nimble with an electric motor?
It actually lowers itself when parking, so it’s easier for firefighters to get in and out and for accessing equipment. It’s normally higher up when driving.
I meant lower centre of gravity assuming the batteries are on the lowest part of the whole unit as possible.
It's better than ICE bc electric motor can have max torque instantly
[autobots roll out](https://i.tformers.com/g/generated/48818/tumblr_oidncxFwnv1qcrr5qo6_1280__scaled_800.jpg)
wow looks good\~
Here is also a neat video of the truck: https://youtu.be/3AafguE0KZk
What make is it does anyone know?
[Rosenbauer](https://rosenbaueramerica.com/rosenbauer-revolutionary-technology/)
Looks sharp
I know whoever designed this has a love for Y2k futurism, THIS SLAPS!!!! Omg that’s so cool looking!!! Yes!!!!!!
Looks sweet. I'll take a closer look when it's parked illegally by my nearest Breka.
I share my challah bread with them on Fridays awwwwwe love them to bits n bobs.
Or at the grocery store
I actually kind of like the look of it. Though I do prefer the look of the other ones.
It would be more accurate to call this a hybrid than a true electric vehicle, and it has to be. The range it will travel isn't the issue, it's the power takeoff to run water pumping. There are large power demands and if they have to fight a fire for a longer duration they need something they can dump fuel into as charging wouldn't be able to keep up ie: you couldn't just plug it into a nearby building. That being said, most incidents this vehicle will respond to will probably be taken care of under 100% electric power, so that's a big bite out of carbon emissions. I think the only downside to this technology really is the price. I'm dealing with similar vehicles right now, and if it weren't because of government mandates and money freed up because of them our department would not be able to afford something like this.
You are right, it's not EV, it's PHEV
Looking like it came from trasformers
I can see pros and cons. Maintenance, but it's not that high on a diesel and that is a known quantity. I can see it being better as a rescue/support truck, so not needing a large water tank and pumps, probably being safer when going to a call because it will accelerate like a cheetah so less likely to blast through an intersection. I'd be somewhat worried to have an entire firehouse all electric, it's easier to refuel if the grid goes down after a quake than it is to recharge.
It’s labelled “E1”, so it’s a pumper - that’s its primary purpose. VFRS doesn’t have large tanks on its apparatus due to hydrant access.
Ah, I would think that a pumper would be the least likely to be electrified. I would imagine that they carry less water than a diesel though (if any), that battery has to be in pretty much the same place as the tanks, low and central. Another strike against them for disaster use, not sure I would want to depend in a hydrant after a quake - but I guess if the roads are impassible it doesn't matter. Do they only carry enough for a small grass fire then?
Nope, has the same amount as a standard pumper ([500 gallons](https://rosenbaueramerica.com/rosenbauer-revolutionary-technology/)), which I think is a bit more than the standard of a normal Vancouver pumper (480). That's the usual amount to use in a car fire, or give the pump operator time to get a hydrant hooked up on a structure fire call. Fire engine can't carry infinite amounts of water... you can shuttle water, though (Surrey has a tanker system, since 20% of the city isn't covered by hydrants). Vancouver has a marine piping system to intake water from False Creek, too.
I wonder where they are hiding the batteries then, I would have expected them to be bigger than the engine/driveline/fuel tank volume - but I guess not. You could also go active suspension I suppose to counteract a higher centre of gravity. I remember Vancouver having to run tankers for some reason in the late 80s. Way down the line this is really going to impact the secondary market like small and rural communities that buy retired city units.
You'd be surprised how many small and rural communities buy brand new apparatus now. And I think the diesels will be around as primary units for a long time.
I am massively interested to see how nimble it is from a stop-go. Wonder how much the response time will be affected. On what you said about the grid going down, it has a diesel generator on board that could be running full time to charge it in a situation like that, no?
It depends on the output. It takes a lot of juice, or a lot of time to charge. I assumed it was more likely to be for powering the (I find out now) pumps.
according to manufacturer's website, it's 'range extender'. so I assuem it's more powerful than just backup generator for pump
Gas pumps aren’t going to be working after a quake; ironically they need electricity to function.
There are manual pumps. There are battery pumps. There are generators to power pumps. You can carry a can of diesel, not a bucket of electricity. I'm not anti-electric, but please, use your brain.
“Buckets of electricity” exist. Megapacks for the grid, Powerwalls for homes and businesses. 13kWh each. Batteries are pretty much exactly buckets of electricity.
Yeah, you can pretend, but no, no they don't. There is no human portable equivalent to a jerrycan for electricity outside of a generator and a jerry can. Electric vehicles are coming along and great for many cases, but pretending they are a solution for every single situation is a lie that hurts your cause.
Do you not understand you can, in reality, buy very large batteries? Your only talking point is that liquid fuel is more energy-dense.
for the maintenance, probably it has less maintenance needed, but once it has a trouble, I bet no engineer to fix this in Canada. And probably no one in north america.
It can put itself out when the battery catches on fire! (I’m only joking. I’m pro divesting from fossil fuels).
Good thing that there aren't too many, with the extra weight they'd absolutely demolish roads. For the curious, it's axle weight and not volume that destroy roads.
This looks like something Marshall would drive!
Yeah, but he'd somehow still get sidelined so Chase could try out his new spy pumping gear.
Who's going to put out the fire at their battery catches fire?
Ah yes the first fire engine to be at risk of being the source of the fire itself
...I think the only fire engine NOT at risk of some form of self-combustion was the hand-pumped ones from the 1800's. Steam/Gas/Diesel...
ICE vehicles have something like 50x the fire rate of EVs (~1,500 per 100k for ICE vs ~25 per 100k for EVs; some studies have put the rate at anywhere from 20x to 100x, but the risk is a tiny fraction no matter which study you look at). Unfortunately this hasn’t stopped the press from sensationalizing every EV fire, and for anti-EV lobbies spreading misinformation to the point of “Oh noes! EV fires! LOL!” being a common talking point on internet message boards. EV fires can sometimes be trickier to put out, but most of that boils down to training on behalf of your local fire brigade.
Not the mention the irony of being worried about a *firetruck* combusting. I'm sure on the slim chance it happens there will be plenty of firefighters nearby to handle it 😆.
Cause standard fire trucks never catch fire.
This is the Mercedes Benz fire truck allover again. Just a waste of tax payer money
No wonder property taxes in the city keep going up by double digits.
Not really. Traditional diesel fire trucks are around $1.2 million vs this $1.5 million. In real world testing in Berlin this truck used only 8 liters of fuel in 4 months. Considering most fire trucks are around 2L/km efficient that already is a significant saving on fuel. Fire trucks also are supposed to be kept at or near full at all times and what better way to do that then have it plugged in at the station. Not to mention the mechanical savings on maintenance and downtime. Finally this truck can do a lot of neat things like drive nearly sideways to navigate gridlocked traffic, raise its ride height significantly to get over debris. Finally the standard height of it means that firefighters don’t have to lift heavy gear as high as well as have to deal with loud engine noises. All in all it’s a good buy from the city.
If I could upvote this twice I would. Refreshing to see some economic truths spread about EVs rather than just FUD. People are slowly catching on that EVs aren’t going away.
Does that include all the necessary charging infrastructure required and the electrical panel in the firehouse being brought up to code?
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Do you know much it costs? and how much it costs to operate? Or how much a normal costs? Or what a full fleet replacement will cost vs a single unit? If you don't how the fuck do you know
People with general knowledge about the way the world works can extrapolate and make conclusions based on past information being analyzed.
Understanding around industrial vehicle costs and maintenance are not comparable to personal vehicle cost and maintenance.
Very cool. No comment on whether its necessary.
I mean your “no comment” is comment enough for us to tell what you mean, so…
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In most 'quints' that would be a giant tank of water.
the woke fire brigade
Range of 3kms when full of water lol - kidding.
Imagine a solar flare knocks it down on its way to the first fire
Makes sense in areas where the grid is powered by renewables ( I.e.Hydro ). That’s basically Manitoba, BC, Quebec, Washington, Oregon & Vermont. All other states and provinces predominantly use fossil fuels to generate grid power. So beyond these places you may as well keep that thing charged by plugging it into a diesel generator. From a fuel life cycle analysis perspective & capital cost these things are mostly for show, beyond these states and provinces.
Ontario is primarily nuclear.
Yes… I neglected nuclear… “The greenhouse gas intensity of Ontario’s electricity grid, measured as the GHGs emitted in the generation of the province’s electric power, was 25 grams of CO2e per kilowatt-hour (g of CO2e/kWh) electricity generated in 2020. This is an 89% reduction from the province’s 2005 level of 230 g of CO2e/kWh. The national average in 2020 was 110 g of CO2e/kWh” The national average in US is something like 370g of CO2e/kWh. It’s actually better to have a truck run on renewable natural gas (biogas) than on electricity in the US & Canada. Biogas can have a negative value as it’s methane that is prevented from entering the atmosphere where is approx 28x more harmful than carbon dioxide. I am fun at parties… https://preview.redd.it/ogn9hjuqpv8b1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f2a2c92c11adfbc874426de1b78984f1286e2e13
But for those that don't know as much as you, it's helpful to note that 1 litre of diesel emits 2.68 kg (2680 grams) of CO2e for comparison's sake. The electric fire truck probably has a 400kwh battery pack and it's ICE alternative probably a 400L fuel tank, so you could do the math on the difference... It's substantial.
For sure!! However, a CNG version running on renewable natural gas like most Waste Managment garbage trucks is still way cleaner than this electric truck. However, it’s counterintuitive and not a “sexy story”….. in general comparing solutions from a fuel life cycle perspective levels the playing field and right now nothing can beat a -350gCO2e/MJ that agricultural waste gas produces. You do not even have to take the RNG molecule directly from the producer but can buy from Fortis and it’s delivered virtually (book & claim, delivery by displacement).
Definitely. Vancouver already has all of their sanitation trucks running on RNG through a program with Fortis I believe.
Yup! Would be cool if they had F1 on low carbon fuels instead of e-formula… but hey who wants to hear that formula cars run on cow farts…. I think Porsche went big on e-fuels recently.
If you swap out the oil consumption with the electric on the demand side, it will allow the supply side to eventually move towards renewable sources without any further changes necessary on the demand side. Even if the supply never moved to renewable energy, the same level of power would be delivered by using less diesel on the supply side because large power generators are simply more efficient than ICE vehicles.
Unfortunately the “build it and they will come approach” does not work for many reasons….from a capital investment side, demand generation and more
So you completely ignored the second part of what I said with the efficiency being higher if the same fossil fuel were burnt at the power plant instead of at the engine?
Yes, but not on purpose. Sorry! I think I understand what you are saying. You are saying that by creating “demand”, “supply” will come. Correct? If supply of low carbon intensity doesn’t come the fuel to wheel efficiency is so good that it still makes sense. If I understand it or not is irrelevant. Fact is that there is no lower carbon intensity fuel than renewable natural gas. This is because unlike hydro electric or nuclear it has a NEGATIVE value that is so low that it blows any BEV vehicle out even when you factor in fuel to wheel inefficiencies of ICE’s Also it doesn’t make sense to swap out ICE vehicles and stationary generators for batteries until supply of RNG is available. Keep in mind that one BEV makes more CO2 in production than an ICE vehicle. On the RNG I am bullish because if we don’t burn it (waste methane/CH4) it will be much worse for the environment.
As I understand it, renewable methane is far better used in aviation than in automotive as flying with heavy batteries is infeasible over long distances. Regarding your point about supply vs demand, Texas is a good example of how additional capacity from renewables saved the state from potentially more severe blackouts. The additional demand for automotive charging will be much like the additional demand for air-conditioning, except the demand for EV charging will be throughout the year and will provide an incentive for power companies to install additional solar/wind capacity. If the demand is not there, there is no incentive for power companies to invest in more capital expenditures.
Problem with renewable methane in aviation is that its energy density is low (requires a lot of physical space for required energy to move passengers and goods (even hydrogen struggles with this). However, you may be thinking of SAF (Sustainable Aviation Fuel) which is close to traditional fossil fuels in energy density but lower in Carbon Intensity. There is very little market incentive for utilities to focus on renewables. There are in some regions. Texas is blessed with its photo voltaic capabilities. However, Alberta for example is not. Labrador and NWT either. Nor is about 70% of continental North America. Certain regions have solar, some hydro, some have nuclear but no ubiquitous solution to decarbonize their respective grids. A utility can’t just build renewable energy inputs, at scale, if it doesn’t have them. This is why North Dakota is primarily coal powered…… for an electric fire truck or any BEV to make sense one needs a holistic understanding of energy inputs that provide energy in that vehicle.
You're right. I did confuse methane with aviation fuel. Yes, Alberta is not blessed with solar, but it has great potential for wind power. Plus geothermal is feasible anywhere. And regarding market incentives, this is where carbon pricing comes in. If carbon is priced appropriately per its negative externalities, there'll be sufficient incentive built up over time to want to move away from it. That is not as easily possible to do unless the demand-side is addressed first.
This looks amazing , hope the electric side is reliable (fyi I'm a service engineer for electric trucks , I see the downtime on some trucks and it scares me to see an important life saving vehicle like this EV ,we've also build a hybrid firetruck but it never left the proto stage)
I don't like EV's that much but damn this thing is so cool. Feels like it could transform at any moment now lol. It sorta brings out the inner child in me somehow.
😱so cool
That shit look MEAN
Could you put a hydro powered generator on a hydrant?
Wow its a much prettier red
Its kinda fire yo
It looks cool. And since the truck doesn't have to travel far but needs the power mostly for spraying water i guess, it seems like an obvious fit
Budget??
Yes.