SuperTruck on Display

by | Mar 3, 2014

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SuperTruckThe Energy Department is displaying an 18-wheeler truck that is meant to exceed baseline energy use by 50 percent by 2015.

The SuperTruck on display, developed by heavy-duty manufacturers Cummins and Peterbilt, has exceeded this goal. Since 2010, the truck has demonstrated a 20 percent increase in engine efficiency and a 70 percent increase in freight efficiency, reaching over 10 miles per gallon under real world driving conditions on a Class 8 tractor-trailer.  In comparison, an average Class 8 truck typically gets 5.8 miles to the gallon.

Commercial trucks, which include Class 8 vehicles, haul as much as 80 percent of the goods transported in the country.  Although they only make up 4 percent of vehicles on the road, they use about 20 percent of the fuel consumed.

Based on the current price of diesel, these technologies should save truck operators more than $20,000 per year on fuel costs.

If all Class 8 trucks in the US were SuperTrucks, the country would consume nearly 300 million fewer barrels of oil and spend nearly $30 billion less on fuel each year.

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