Volta Trucks X Electroverse: The EV Rally 2024

You may have seen us splashed on the side of a truck on our socials recently, but did you know it was fully electric? Volta Trucks are leading the charge in the electric transport space and we got to chat with them about their history, their current experience and future goals as an electric transport company!

Plus, we wanted to hear more about their adventure from London -> Geneva (and back!) during the EV Rally 2024!

So here's our 10-question chat with one of the Lead Test and Validation Engineers, Dave, at Volta Trucks!

Let's get plugged in...

1. Before we dive into the EV Rally, we’d like to get to know a little more about your journey as an electric transport company!

‘Volta Trucks’ was founded in 2017, can you tell us a little bit about the history behind Volta?

Volta Trucks was founded by Carl-Magnus Norden and Kjell Waloen after studying developments in the passenger car market and consulting widely with commercial logistics providers, they saw a huge opportunity for zero emission clean last mile delivery vehicles in cities. In 2020 they revealed the fully ground up designed Volta Zero, a 16/18t all electric truck with best in class pure driver vision. In 2022 the first pilot test fleet vehicles went out for trials with customers and received a huge positive response.

2. Volta Trucks prides itself on ‘zero-tailpipe emissions’, your exciting, environmental designs are pushing the future of commercial electric trucks forwards! What else is high on your priority list for protecting the environment?

With a fresh new design, everything can be considered. Volta is committed to reducing the environmental impact of its vehicles and the components they’re built from, through to its supply chain and manufacturing footprint. Almost every part can be recycled directly or reused before recycling. We deeply believe in leaving the planet a better place for future generations.

3. Volta Trucks was recently acquired by the Luxor Capital Group, how has this move strengthened your place in the EV transport industry?

 Luxor Capital Group have been a key investor in Volta from early on, they have enabled us to continue our journey and accelerate bringing our innovative trucks to market.

4. Part of Volta Trucks’ branding is their “human-centric” design. What steps did you take in your design process to ensure your trucks are as safe and user-friendly as possible?

If you look at any truck, the driver has to climb up two or three steps to get into the cab and sits on top of the engine. Once inside the direct vision from the cab is very limited, Zero changes this… we placed the cab low down (we have no engine), extending the side windows and full length glass doors. This gives Zero 220 degrees of direct driver vision, at eye level with pedestrians and cyclists. The driver walks in from a door that opens onto the pavement and sits in the middle to drive. An array of cameras cover every area outside of the direct vision cab. All this makes driving a Zero a huge pleasure, it glides away with ease and is highly manoeuvrable.

5. So, back to the EV Rally, what inspired you to take part in this yearly event?

As engineers on this vehicle, we knew that it was much more than just last mile delivery capable. We wanted a way to demonstrate just how good by doing something a little crazy… a 2500km round trip seemed about right 😊 we gathered tons of data from driving, charging, varying weather conditions and even tested manoeuvrability (when we got lost in small French towns)!

6. Electroverse and Volta Trucks teamed up for your adventure from London to Geneva (and back again!), how did you find charging using our app and/or Electrocard across three different countries?

The app worked so well it became our only source for information on charge stations, especially as we needed to understand how tight access was for our 2.5m wide, 9m long, 3.4m high truck. Attempting a journey like this needed solid reliable charging. We didn’t struggle, it worked. Every time we waved the Electroverse card at a charger, it worked. If you browse our journey in the app through France and Switzerland ‘Zero Maureen’ can be seen at every charger we used.

7. Tell us more about the truck you used for your journey?

We love to name our trucks. Doris, Cynthia, Keith… can all be seen out and about in mostly the UK right now. They are all named by our engineering team for various reasons, almost always a family link. Maureen is actually an early pilot test vehicle and is an older prototype. She has a 200kWh usable battery and will do ~320km (200miles) on a full charge. Our latest vehicles have 235kWh batteries for even more range, and from this journey we can confidently recommend the smaller 150kWh version, saving resources and cost for last mile deliveries in cities.

8. The EV Rally is an extreme road trip - not a regular journey! Was this the longest distance a Volta Truck has done so far and what sort of journeys do you envision Volta Trucks doing on a daily basis?

It’s the longest continuous journey for sure. We have travelled further on one charge, it really depends on load and location. For last mile delivery in cities speed is an average of 8kph… Geneva broke our record for slowest city drive at 4kph. Most delivery drives don’t exceed ~100km a day. Pretty much… range isn’t a problem.

9. Electric trucks are still relatively uncommon in the EV landscape, did you come across any problems as a large, electric vehicle travelling such a long distance?

Access to charge points! We had to get creative getting in and out … and may have reversed into areas to get access. It’s a very real problem for such a large vehicle… we did find several dedicated truck charging stations (and new ones being built). These had wide access pull through bays which could take trailers etc and also tended to be 300-400kW high power chargers. Canopies seem like a great idea, and a lot of stations in France have them… but at 3.4m high we only just fit, even on our lowest suspension setting.

10. By the end of this year (2024), Volta Trucks are aiming to begin deliveries to Germany, followed by France, UK and Scandinavia! Would you say these plans are on track? And, after this, what’s next for Volta?

We have already built our first batch of trucks in final production form, due to be delivered to a customer in Germany in the coming months. Next year is all about scaling up, expanding our organisation and working with our customers to smooth their transition to electric vehicles in their operations.

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