New Zealand-owned waste management and streetscape maintenance company Civic Contractors has introduced a new EV truck to carry out sanitation and street cleaning.
The 11-tonne truck picks up various-sized wheelie bins and washes them with hot water and steam, killing pathogens and bacteria (including COVID-19) and eliminating bad smells.
Its dual function pressure-washes and sanitises hard surfaces like city streets and pavements, using steam.
The truck is the first vehicle of its kind in New Zealand to use hot water rather than chemical agents for cleaning and sanitising and has a system for capturing dirty water to prevent it from entering local waterways.
The vehicle cost over $300,000 to design and build and was partially funded by a governmental Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA) grant.
The 11-tonne truck is a SEA Electric EV cab and chassis with body and equipment built by Manco Engineering.
It’s based in Auckland and began operating on May 18 travelling around 200km or eight hours before it needs to be charged.
Limitations in current EV technology means it requires a small diesel unit to heat the water for the bin-washing equipment, but Civic says this is a short-term solution until technological gains are made in this area.
Compared to a diesel truck of this size, the reduction in carbon emissions is around 25 tonnes of CO2 per year.
“Hot-washing and steam cleaning is an effective solution for killing pathogens and bacteria that spread disease, but also that attract rodents and make the rubbish bins stink,” Civic Contractors managing director Bjorn Revfeim says.
“Now with the COVID-19 crisis, the issue of sanitisation of hard surfaces and bins has become more important than ever.”
“We’ve custom-designed the truck in the hope that New Zealand will take further steps to increase environmentally friendly waste collection services such as residential food waste collections, and eventually eliminate the need for single-use plastic bags in public streets and parks bins.
“Initially, we are going to get the truck working within our existing streetscape contracts – so, cleaning street bins and other street furniture and footpaths. In the future, we hope to see it being used at hospitals and medical clinics, food manufacturing and processing facilities, and any commercial businesses that are sensitive to organic waste material.“At this stage, we’re interested to hear from other businesses and industries that might be interested in trialling out our new machine,” Revfeim says. READ MORE
EV Talk, Nigel Moffiet, 18th May 2020
