Photo: Rivian
Back in the fall of 2019 online giant Amazon rocked the electric vehicle world by announcing it is planning to purchase no less than 100,000 electric delivery vans from Rivian. It said it would do so as it was looking to become net-zero in terms of carbon by 2040.
It was clear from the get-go that the massive figure would not be easily met by Rivian, a company that despite growing in size is still not big enough to handle such a massive order in a short period of time. That's why Amazon said it will buy the 100k vehicles over a period of ten years, with the fleet expected to be complete by 2030.
It was unclear until this week how far along the company was in achieving its goal. In a rare instance when it gives an update on how things are going, Amazon did shed some light on this part of its business, and so far things are not looking all that bright as far as announced goals are concerned.
And it's easy to see why. When it announced the purchase of electric vans, Rivian had ten years to deliver 100,000 vans. That was an average of 10,000 vans per year at the time. It's 2023 already, so the Amazon fleet should have counted 30,000 Rivian vans already.
But when the e-commerce giant announced the plan the van was not even developed, so some time was to go into designing the thing. So, instead of 30k, there are now only 5,000 of them on America's roads, with the first units delivered starting last year.
That means the EV maker somehow needs to accelerate production and ship 95,000 vehicles over a period of just seven years. That's an average of 13,500 units per year.
Despite the slow rollout of the electric van fleet, Amazon is still hopeful it'll get there by 2030. It is also extremely happy with what the current fleet of Rivian EVs managed to do so far, delivering a total of 150 million packages to customers in 800 cities and regions.
Amazon has expanded the reach of the Rivian vans to other regions as well, with roads in Germany presently being roamed by 300 of them, which have recently joined the fleet there.
The company is not using solely the Rivian vans for its purposes, but has a series of vehicles produced by others working toward the same goal. Including e-cargo bikes and e-rickshaws, some 15 distinct models are serving Amazon's delivery needs all over the world.
Officially called Rivian EDV, the Amazon delivery van comes in three configurations and has a range of about 150 miles (240 km). It can carry up to 840 cubic feet (24 cubic meters) of cargo.
It was unclear until this week how far along the company was in achieving its goal. In a rare instance when it gives an update on how things are going, Amazon did shed some light on this part of its business, and so far things are not looking all that bright as far as announced goals are concerned.
And it's easy to see why. When it announced the purchase of electric vans, Rivian had ten years to deliver 100,000 vans. That was an average of 10,000 vans per year at the time. It's 2023 already, so the Amazon fleet should have counted 30,000 Rivian vans already.
But when the e-commerce giant announced the plan the van was not even developed, so some time was to go into designing the thing. So, instead of 30k, there are now only 5,000 of them on America's roads, with the first units delivered starting last year.
That means the EV maker somehow needs to accelerate production and ship 95,000 vehicles over a period of just seven years. That's an average of 13,500 units per year.
Despite the slow rollout of the electric van fleet, Amazon is still hopeful it'll get there by 2030. It is also extremely happy with what the current fleet of Rivian EVs managed to do so far, delivering a total of 150 million packages to customers in 800 cities and regions.
Amazon has expanded the reach of the Rivian vans to other regions as well, with roads in Germany presently being roamed by 300 of them, which have recently joined the fleet there.
The company is not using solely the Rivian vans for its purposes, but has a series of vehicles produced by others working toward the same goal. Including e-cargo bikes and e-rickshaws, some 15 distinct models are serving Amazon's delivery needs all over the world.
Officially called Rivian EDV, the Amazon delivery van comes in three configurations and has a range of about 150 miles (240 km). It can carry up to 840 cubic feet (24 cubic meters) of cargo.
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