Volta Trucks is aiming to become the world’s most sustainable commercial vehicle manufacturer
With the Volta Zero, Volta Trucks initiates the world’s first purpose-built full-electric 16-tonne vehicle, designed for inner-city freight deliveries. Going far beyond just tailpipe emissions, Volta Trucks has adopted a holistic and comprehensive approach to sustainability.
“Sustainability is at the very core of our business. Saving the planet cannot wait, it must happen now, and Volta Trucks wants to spearhead the rapid change in large commercial vehicles, from outdated diesel to clean and safe technological solutions”. Carl-Magnus Norden, Founder of Volta Trucks.
Holistic truck design
For the development of the Volta Zero, Volta Trucks have gone far beyond the installation of an electric drivetrain in a traditional truck. They have started from scratch and questioned all aspects of a truck for inner-city freight deliveries. Beyond implementing a state of the art fully electric drivetrain Volta Trucks have chosen to partner with Bcomp, making use of ampliTex™ and powerRibs™ technologies for stiff and light weight body panels. With the electric drivetrain, the Volta Zero will enable 24-hour usage for its operator while significantly reducing a city’s noise pollution. Its unique cabin design, which gives the driver a wide 220-degrees view, will make traffic much safer for pedestrians and cyclists
High-tech body panels with natural ampliTex™
For the body panels of this revolutionising electric truck, Volta works with Bcomp’s proprietary solutions. The use of ampliTex™ technical fabrics – reinforced by the powerRibs™ grid technology – in body panels enables significant weight-savings while causing up to 75% lower CO2 emissions compared to matching carbon fibre parts. In addition to Bcomp’s flax fibres, Volta Trucks uses a novel biobased and biodegradable resin derived from Rape Seed oil to further reduce the footprint of the whole vehicle. At the end of their life, parts made from natural flax fibres can become a CO2-neutral energy source when incinerated through standard waste management system for heat recovery, without residual waste – opposed to traditional composite materials that often end up in landfills.
Most importantly, the construction with ampliTex™ and powerRibs™ enables the Volta Zero to become a significantly safer vehicle. The body panels will not shatter upon impact and cause a risk of further injury with sharp edges and debris but rather deform and finally fail in a more flexible and safer way. Moreover, flax composites being non-conductive, they pose less risk in the event of a vehicle accident.
Hitting the road soon
The first prototype Volta Zero is currently being built and will be launched later in 2020 with the first pilot test vehicles due to start evaluation with customers in Q1-2021.
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