Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

gothamist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 579 posts

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#341

Post by LeifCarrotson »

akira2501 wrote: post #307
fencepost wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Garbage trucks are probably one of the best places for it actually, because they stop so frequently. Unfortunately the article is about plow trucks instead which have a very different use case - New York just happens to use the same vehicles for both so they have a smaller fleet that's not as well suited to either task. For garbage trucks you have stop and go movement so EVs eliminate idling. Given the size of the tr…

> so EVs eliminate idling. The vehicle, when stopped, has other functions to perform. It has hydraulic lifters and compactors that need quite a bit of power to operate. It's a working platform, not a simple garbage transportation mechanism. Even to the extent is isn't for transportation, see how far away the dump is from your home. That distance has to be covered twice at least once a day, and possibly as much as 3 t…

As an industrial EE dealing with hydraulics of much larger scales than those on a garbage truck, those other functions do not require significant power to operate when compared to actually accelerating the vehicle and cargo up to speed (and then slamming on the brakes/regen again for the next stop).

The engines in diesel garbage trucks often run at idle when those hydraulics are working, lifting a 100 kg residential can or a 1-ton dumpster through a few meters of motion is not noticeable to a 350 HP diesel, accelerating 30 tons of truck and trash in the same amount of time is why they're equipped with so much more engine power.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#342

Post by newsclues »

sh1mmer wrote: post #305

For these industrial use cases I’m surprised hot swappable batteries aren’t being considered more. Are these current trucks doing 12 hour shifts plowing snow and hauling garbage on a single tank of diesel, or are they refueling? I get that fast changing infrastructure is hard and waiting 15-90 minutes to charge a battery isn’t ideal. But couldn’t they stop to swap out batteries or have another vehicle meet each truck…

Is 3MPG really that bad, given the size and stop and go? I assume they are 10x the load of a pickup truck and F-150s don't get 30MPG city do they?

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#343

Post by bsder »

ilamont wrote: post #155

I was thinking about vehicles that can't switch to electric power. The tech's not there yet, and may never be. Cargo ships. Jumbo jets. Military aircraft. Specialized industrial vehicles, such as those used for mines. Unless these use cases are made obsolete (possible, such as military) society will depend on fossil fuels for many decades to come.

> Specialized industrial vehicles, such as those used for mines.

A lot of industrial vehicles that need high torque at low speed are effectively turbodiesel generators driving eletric motors already.

Replacing such a setup with a battery is a lot easier that a full blown ICE vehicle.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#344

Post by topspin »

mabbo wrote: post #104

Why are they using garbage trucks to plow snow? Looks, I get that I'm biased being in Canada, but do they understand that you can buy dedicated vehicles for plowing snow ? They're called... snowplows. They're pretty fantastic. You need garbage trucks every day, all year. Electrify those. You need snowplows on a handful of days per year- and that number is falling thanks to climate change. So buy purpose-built snowplo…

> Why are they using garbage trucks to plow snow?

Fewer vehicles to acquire, maintain, store, etc. That seems self evident.

Further, the scheme works fine. The issue isn't whether plowing snow and collecting garbage with the same vehicle is a workable idea. The issue is that there isn't an electric replacement available yet.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#345

Post by kibwen »

wolverine876 wrote: post #306
happyopossum wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The buses I’m familiar with that use overhead power lines don’t use them exclusively - they have batteries or diesel for when they venture off the powered lines.

I wonder what they do when a bus runs out of power - towtrucks? Charging trucks?

Extension cord into the nearest bodega? :P

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#346

Post by redox99 »

djtriptych wrote: post #230

This smells to me at least a little bit like union pressure to slow the transition to electric vehicles, which is just a hop from fully autonomous city vehicles, putting them all out of work forever.

How is it just a hop from fully autonomous city vehicles? The sensor suite and software doesn't really care about the type of engine. Waymo's Chrysler Pacificas are hybrids in fact.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#347

Post by the-rc »

the-rc wrote: post #339
legitster wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about this. I don't think battery swapping scales up very well. Firstly, I know someone who works on Daimler's electric trucks and he assures me that their electric powertrains are EXTREMELY dangerous just from the amount of power represented. Union operators have expressed negative interest in connecting/disconnecting the batteries outside of the factory. Secondly, the economics - the battery pack on a…

Citibike wants to connect to the city grid so they don't need to send technicians to every station to swap dead batteries. It's not too much of a stretch to think that, perhaps, the stations could recharge truck batteries, too, at some point. Many fewer residents bike during the winter, let alone during a snow storm, so you could, conceivably, sacrifice a bike space or two or five in December-February (or just when y…

The other point I forgot to make is that, during a storm, you could ground a lot of other non-essential electric vehicles, e.g. buses, and place their batteries strategically throughout the city (at a bike station, or empty parking spots). Once the emergency is over, you're not stuck with a lot of excess inventory. That, again, assumes a lot: common batteries, etc.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#348

Post by dekhn »

jstarfish wrote: post #213
opwieurposiu wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You want to run an engine once a month or so to keep all the internal parts protected from rust by a thin film of oil. It is best to let it heat up all the way to drive out as much moisture as possible. Internal rusting is a big issue on airplanes that do not get flown often enough. The first thing to go are the cam shafts. https://www.aviationpros.com/home/article/10387461/corrosion...

> It is best to let it heat up all the way to drive out as much moisture as possible. > Internal rusting is a big issue on airplanes that do not get flown often enough. I was always told to take the car for an actual drive (including a highway stretch) to achieve these ends, otherwise the moisture you're expelling accumulates in the exhaust system. Looking around the neighborhood, I assume the people with the rusted-…

In fact there was just a PR blitz about not idling to circulate oil: https://cars.usnews.com/cars-trucks/features/aaa-says-dont-w...

Since I have yet to see any of these various claims having any impact on the maintainability or function of my car, I think I'll stick to my plan of not wasting the gas in my engine for months at a time.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#349

Post by jacquesm »

wolverine876 wrote: post #246
jacquesm wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arnhem in NL and Riga in Latvia, both cities I spend a lot of time in still have them, but I wonder for how long. They're pretty iconic but every few years there is debate about whether or not it is still worth it. Another problem I forgot to mention is that these systems are not very flexible in dealing with mishaps, you can't overtake another trolley bus so if one has a problem the whole system grinds to a halt. An…

I agree about the trolleys on rails and obstacles, which I've seen for myself, but electric vehicles would likely have some battery and run on tires, allowing diversions from the route. Anyway, I'm guessing it's been considered and I'd love to see the study.

I've been reading a bit more about it in the meantime: so, the trolley network in Arnhem is slowly diminishing in size, but it's still there and it will likely be there for quite a while to come. They are looking at ways to use a combination BEV / trolley system to allow the buses to recharge when they're on the line so they can depart from the route for longer stretches.

The maneuvering in case of trouble situation is covered by a tiny diesel engine that can move the bus around to the point where it can reconnect to a working segment of the network.

One problem with reducing the coverage is that it is relatively easy to take away the lines but the poles are in large chunks of concrete and not easy to remove at all.

Re: NYC officials say they can't find EV garbage trucks powerful enough to plow snow

#350

Post by ars »

chimeracoder wrote: post #316
ars wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not the parking spots - residents have zero interest in walking to the end of their block with garbage. If they tried it people would just leave their garbage on the street. Have you been in NY? There's garbage everywhere.

> It's not the parking spots - residents have zero interest in walking to the end of their block with garbage. Nobody would have to do that. They'd have to walk an extra 10 ft from the front of their building to the curb. Unless they live in a multifamily building (which is most of the city), in which case the building superintendent would do that. > Have you been in NY? There's garbage everywhere. Because that's the…

> They'd have to walk an extra 10 ft from the front of their building to the curb.

I mentioned in another post it's mostly row houses, sometimes with the 1st and 2nd floor separate living areas. Not huge apartments - you can't put a dumpster in front of every house.

The dumpster would go at the end of the block, no one will support walking that far with their garbage. Not when they are used to a different way.

Post reply on HN