Postal Service to Buy 9,250 Ford Electric Vehicles

<p>The United States Postal Service awarded contracts for 9&comma;250 Ford left-hand drive &lpar;LHD&rpar; battery electric vehicles &lpar;BEVs&rpar; as well as initial orders for more than 14&comma;000 charging stations to be deployed at Postal Service facilities around the country&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Overall&comma; the Postal Service’s total investment in vehicles is expected to reach &dollar;9&period;6 billion&comma; including &dollar;3 billion from Inflation Reduction Act &lpar;IRA&rpar; funds&period; The December 2022 plan announced intended acquisitions over the next five years of a 75 percent electric fleet of Next Generation Delivery Vehicles &lpar;NGDV&rpar;&period; Acquisitions of NGDV after 2026 will be 100 percent electric&period; As part of the earliest stages of the delivery vehicle replacement plan&comma; a contract for 9&comma;250 commercial-off-the-shelf &lpar;COTS&rpar; internal combustion engine vehicles will also be concurrently awarded to fill the urgent need for vehicles&period; The specific locations for deployment of the vehicles and infrastructure have not yet been finalized and will depend on route characteristics&comma; including whether a left-hand drive vehicle is mission-suitable as well as other business considerations&period; The Postal Service plans to begin building out its charging infrastructure across a minimum of 75 locations within the next 12 months&comma; and thereafter to continue the infrastructure build out in the succeeding years at many additional facilities as a part of our delivery vehicle electrification strategy&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We are moving forward with our plans to simultaneously improve our service&comma; reduce our cost&comma; grow our revenue&comma; and improve the working environment for our employees&period; Electrification of our vehicle fleet is now an important component of these initiatives&comma;” said Louis DeJoy&comma; Postmaster General&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We have developed a strategy that mitigates both cost and risk of deployment – which enable execution on this initiative to begin now&period; I again want to thank the Administration officials and members of Congress who have assisted us in this initiative&period; Each has shown genuine understanding that our movement toward electrification must be thoughtful and deliberate&comma; must appropriately manage risk&comma; and must be consistent with our primary delivery mission for the American people&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><strong>Electric Vehicle Awards<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>After a competitive search&comma; the Postal Service awarded a contract to purchase a total of 9&comma;250 Ford E-Transit Battery Electric Vehicles &lpar;BEVs&rpar;&period;  Delivery of the vehicles is intended to commence in December of this year&comma; assuming successful completion of the Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement that we announced we would undertake in August 2022&comma; and the related issuance of our Record of Decision pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act&period; These domestically sourced vehicles will be 100 percent electric and are part of the 21&comma;000 COTS vehicles included in the Postal Service’s vehicle acquisition plan announced in December 2022&period; The Ford E-Transit BEVs are manufactured in Kansas City&comma; MO&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><strong>Electric Vehicle Charging Station Awards<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>To support the charging for all the newly purchased electric vehicles&comma; both the COTS vehicles announced today and future acquisitions including NGDV&comma; the Postal Service awarded competitive contracts to three suppliers for the purchase of more than 14&comma;000 charging stations to establish an initial and ongoing Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment &lpar;EVSE&rpar; inventory&period; This EVSE inventory is the charging station hardware and software needed to support EV charging at the facilities from which the delivery vehicles will operate&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The Postal Service anticipates that this commitment of funds by 2028 for both vehicles and charging infrastructure will result in a total of 66&comma;230 electric delivery vehicles and an overall acquisition of 106&comma;000 delivery vehicles&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;