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Seattle’s Office of Sustainability & Environment, in conjunction with Mayor Bruce Harrell, have announced a new pilot program to incentivize heavy-duty truck electrification.
Operating as a point-of-sale rebate, where the manufacturer or distributor will be reimbursed by the city, the program would mean up to 40% off the retail price of new electric trucks. The maximum per vehicle reimbursement would be $180,000, and the available funding totals $1.7 million. Assuming the maximum per vehicle reimbursement, that translates into fewer than 10 new electric trucks.
According to a Thursday news release from the office, the Electric Trucks Pilot program is “aimed at supporting local truck drivers’ transition to electric freight vehicles and improve[ing] air quality in the port-adjacent communities of the Duwamish Valley where heavy freight activity is one of the largest contributors to air pollution.”
The Duwamish River Valley is a large stretch of waterway extending from Seattle’s southern border near the Renton/Tukwila area north 12 miles to the SoDo neighborhood, just south of downtown Seattle.
Comprised of predominantly industrial zoning, the valley includes the Port of Seattle’s Harbor Island, as well as the SoDo, Georgetown and South Park neighborhoods.
“Seattle is proud of our roots and our future as a port city – with new jobs, housing, and thriving industrial and maritime lands – but we also know that its neighbors who bear the brunt of the diesel pollution that comes from heavy-duty trucks moving goods throughout the Duwamish Valley,” Harrell said in the news release, before going on to highlight how this pilot program aligns with the objectives of the One Seattle Climate Justice Agenda.
This program is similar to the recent $16.3 million in grants the Department of Ecology announced for fleet electrification, as previously reported by The Center Square.
On Tuesday, the Department of Ecology and Department of Commerce made a joint announcement regarding another similar program, $127.5 million in electric vehicle charging station grants.
“Transportation is responsible for 61% of the City’s greenhouse gas emissions, with approximately 9% coming from freight. Seattle aims to achieve 30% zero-emission goods delivery by 2030, in line with the City’s Transportation Electrification Blueprint,” the news release states.
That blueprint has the goal of making Seattle a carbon neutral city by 2050.
To accomplish that goal, the city has a long way to go.
“There are 4,000 trucks serving the Port of Seattle, and right now all of them are running on high-polluting diesel engines,” said Jessyn Farrell, Seattle director of the Office of Sustainability & Environment, in a statement in the news release.
“Through the Electric Trucks Pilot, we aim to support drivers in bringing the first electric trucks in the City by 2024, while working in partnership with State and Federal governments to further bring down the cost of zero-emissions vehicles and creating the needed infrastructure to support them,” she noted.