Wrightspeed CEO and Tesla-cofounder wants to retrofit medium and heavy-duty fossil-fueled trucks with efficient electric powertrains, making them cleaner, quieter, energy-efficient and easier to maintain.
There is a growing market to transform commercial fleet trucks into cleaner electric hybrid conversions. Trucking fleet owners are scrambling to meet California's new strict emissions standards but they do not want to replace their fleet vehicles. Wrightspeed are installing plug-in powertrains featuring an electric motor, battery system and an on-board generator that runs on diesel/natural gas to automatically charge the batteries. A Wrightspeed powertrain can run on batteries for about 30 miles before the generator kicks in and recharges the battery system. A typical retrofit costs 150-200K instead of new 500K commercial trucks.
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