Back to Specialty Food News

Amazon Readies Electric Vehicles for Holiday Deliveries

Specialty Food Association

Amazon is preparing its electric vehicle fleet for its first-ever holiday season, it announced Monday.

Over the summer, the company rolled out EVs to more than a dozen cities, including Baltimore, Chicago, Dallas, Kansas City, Nashville, Phoenix, San Diego, Seattle, and St. Louis. It now has over 1,000 vehicles in more than 100 U.S. cities making deliveries.

The news comes as Amazon and Rivian continue to make progress toward their goal to put 100,000 electric delivery vehicles on the road by 2030.

“We’re always excited for the holiday season, but making deliveries to customers across the country with our new zero-emission vehicles for the first time makes this year unique,” said Udit Madan, VP of Amazon Transportation, in a statement. “We’ve already delivered over 5 million packages with our vehicles produced by Rivian, and this is still just the beginning—that figure will grow exponentially as we continue to make progress toward our 100,000-vehicle goal.”

Amazon is committed to reaching net-zero carbon by 2040 as a part of its commitment to The Climate Pledge, and electric delivery vehicles are an important part of that work.

“Fleet electrification is essential to reaching the world’s zero-emissions goal,” said Jiten Behl, chief growth officer at Rivian, in a statement. “So, to see our ramp up in production supporting Amazon’s rollout in cities across the country is amazing. Not just for the environment, but also for our teams working hard to get tens of thousands of electric delivery vehicles on the road. They continue to be motivated by our combined mission and the great feedback about the vehicle’s performance and quality.”

Amazon also recently announced plans to invest more than $1 billion over the next five years to further electrify and decarbonize its transportation network across Europe, part of the company’s work to deliver packages to customers more sustainably. Full Story

Related: United Airlines Debuts Grab-and-Go Concept; Walmart Reverts to 2021 Prices for Holiday Basket

Topics: