UPS to Add 6,000 CNG Trucks

Over the next three years, United Parcel Services Inc. plans to purchase more than 6,000 trucks capable of running on compressed natural gas.

The company is investing $450 million in the program, which also will expand UPS’s CNG refueling infrastructure. By the end of 2019, the company will be operating 61 CNG stations in the U.S., Canada and the U.K.

The new trucks will include a mix of heavy-duty vehicles, terminal tractors and medium-duty walk-in delivery vans. Hexagon Composites ASA’s Agility Fuel Solutions unit, which already has supplied CNG systems for 1,700 UPS trucks, will provide the complete fuel systems and related storage tanks for the new fleet.

The trucks will be capable of running on conventional CNG or renewable natural gas. RNG, which is produced from landfills, dairy farms and other bio-fuel sources, cuts lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 90% compared with conventional diesel engines, according to UPS.

The company has agreed to purchase the equivalent of 230 million gallons of RNG over the next seven years. UPS claims the plan will make it the largest consumer of RNG in the transportation industry.