Field Operations Program - US Postal Service Fountain Valley Electric Carrier Route Vehicle Testing
The United States Postal Service (USPS) has ordered 500 light-duty electric carrier route vehicles (ECRV) mostly for their delivery carriers to use in several California locations. The 500 ECRVs have been defined as a demonstration fleet to support a decision of potentially ordering 5,500 additional ECRVs. Several different test methods are being used by the USPS to evaluate the 500-vehicle deployment. One of these test methods is the ECRV Customer Acceptance Test Program at Fountain Valley, California. Two newly manufactured ECRVs were delivered to the Fountain Valey Post Office and eighteen mail carriers primarily drove the ECRVs on "park and loop" mail delivery routes for a period of 2 days each. This ECRV testing consisted of 36 route tests, 18 tests per vehicle. The 18 mail carriers testing the ECRVs were surveyed for the opinions on the performance of the ECRVs. The U.S. Department of Energy, through its Field Operations Program, is supporting the USPS's ECRV testing activities both financially and with technical expertise. As part of this support, Field Operations Program personnel at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory have compiled this report based on the data generated by the USPS and its testing contractor (Ryerson, Master and Associates, Inc.) During the 36 route tests, the two test vehicles were driven a total of 474 miles, averaging 13 mile per test. The distance of the 36 route tests ranged from 4 to 34 miles. Both miles driven and State-of-Charge (SOC) data was collected for only 28 of the route tests. During these 28 tests, the ECRVs were driven a total of 447 miles. The SOC used during the 28 tests averaged a 41% decrease and the average distance driven was 16 miles. This suggests that a 16-mile route uses almost half of the ECRV's battery energy. The 18 carriers also rated 12 ECRV traits that included the physical design of the ECRVs as well as their performance. Based on a scale of 1 being the lowest and 5 being highest, or best, the overall average score for the ECRV was 4.3. The report also included individual comments from the ECRV drivers.
- Research Organization:
- Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- DE-AC07-99ID-13727
- OSTI ID:
- 911413
- Report Number(s):
- INEEL/EXT-02-00084; TRN: US200724%%774
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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