REGINA — The city of Regina showed off a new electric-powered truck as its latest addition to its city operations fleet Friday.
It is a Ford F-150 Lightning electric truck. It is the first electric truck for the city fleet, and will be used first with the parks department and then with roadways.
The vehicle was unveiled at Capital Ford Lincoln Friday afternoon, where Mayor Sandra Masters got to see the new truck and all of its features. The truck is part of Regina’s effort to become a greener city.
“We understand the need to act and we’re going to achieve our goal of becoming a net-zero city by 2050,” says Mayor Sandra Masters. “Regina’s Energy and Sustainability Plan will be realized when the recommendations within the report become actions by the city and by the community.”
The truck purchase came out of the city’s fleet reserves, at a price of around $58,000 to $62,000. According to Greg Kuntz, manager for Sustainable Energy and Adaptation at city of Regina, while the purchase price is about $20,000 more than gas-powered vehicles, they expect to save $40,000 in fuel costs for an overall savings of $20,000 over the lifetime of the vehicle. That is based on the energy consumption numbers he was able to glean from driving the vehicle for about a week.
“And you think about how big our fleet is, that’s a big savings overall,” said Kuntz. As well, they expect much lower maintenance costs than a conventional engine. “There’s approximately 20 times fewer moving parts in it, so less stuff to wear out.”
One of the things they want to learn more about is how the new electric truck works during the winter months, and gather more data about what the impact would be to transition to a fully electric fleet.
“Speaking with others who do drive them in winter, it does draw the battery down quicker,” said Kuntz. But he said “being with the city of Regina’s an ideal situation for these trucks, because we are within city boundaries, we’re not driving them long distances, so we’ve got easy access to charging infrastructure.”
This purchase is just one initiative touted by the City of Regina to reduce vehicle emissions, with the city transitioning to electric ice re-surfacers, and also putting in charging infrastructure starting to support a fully electric vehicle fleet including electric buses.
Regina is planning to transition to electric buses starting in 2024, and by 2035 all light duty city vehicles purchased are to be electric. For medium and heavy-duty trucks, Regina is looking at electric, hydrogen-fueled and renewable diesel as options.
