Daimler Trucks has unveiled the Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck, a fully electric heavy-duty truck with a range of up to 200km and an admissible total weight of 26 tonnes.
The eTruck is based on a heavy-duty, three axle short-radius Mercedes-Benz distribution truck.
The company has however replaced the conventional drivetrain by a new electrically driven rear axle with motors directly adjacent to the wheel hubs.
The company noted that the new technology is still under development and is planning the product for market release by the next decade. Since 2014, Daimler’s electric trucks have been undergoing customer trails with the Fuso Canter E-Cell.
As part of the strategy to build its technical leadership in the field of electric mobility, Daimler is making future investments through the truck division in the fields of research and development flow to advance in the field of full electric drive.
This increases dependency on heavy trucks is at the expense of air quality across many cities. Daimler also noted that European cities like London and Paris are considering the ban of internal combustion engines, especially for heavy transport vehicles in the near future.
So, there could be no alternative expect to opt for fully electric trucks to ensure the supply of goods is not affected.
So far, fully electric trucks seemed unimaginable because of the high costs of batteries, coupled with low range. According to Daimler, this situation has changed now.
During the period between 1997 and 2025 the cost of batteries is going down by a factor of 2.5 from €500/kWh to €200/kWh, there has been an equal improvement in the performance and range of with 80Wh/kg to 200Wh/kg.
Daimler Trucks & Buses Management Board member Wolfgang Bernhard said: "Electric drive systems previously only saw extremely limited use in trucks. Nowadays costs, performance and charging times develop further so rapidly that now there is a trend reversal in the distribution sector: the time is ripe for the electric truck.
“In light distribution trucks, our Fuso Canter E-Cell has already been undergoing intensive customer trials since 2014. And with the Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck, we are now electrifying the heavy distribution segment up to 26 tonnes. We intend to establish electric driving as systematically as autonomous and connected driving,"
Daimler says that the design of the heavy truck has been totally revised. The conventional drivetrain has been totally replaced by an electrically driven rear axle with electric motors directly adjacent to the wheel hubs. These have been derived from Mercedes-Benz Citaro hybrid bus. The electric drive is powered by three lithium-ion battery modules, adding up to a range of 200km.
The company also noted that the light weight trucks that are being tested have already crossed 50,000km per year and have reduced about 37% emissions compared to diesel engines, taking into account the electricity produced to power the batteries. It was also noted that the cost of operating the vehicles fell by about 67% than conventional diesel powered trucks.
Mercedes-Benz Trucks head Stefan Buchner said: "With the Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck, we are underlining our intention to systematically developing the electric drive in trucks to series production maturity.
“This means that we will begin to integrate customers, so as to gain valuable joint experience with respect to the operating ranges and the charging infrastructure in daily transport operations.
“Because we think the entry of this technology into the series production is already conceivable at the beginning of the next decade."
Image: Daimler demonstrates Mercedes-Benz Urban eTruck, fully electric heavy truck in Germany. Photo: Courtesy of Daimler AG.
