Amazon commits 10,000 electric vehicles to its India delivery fleet by 2025

Amazon, the world’s biggest online retailer, said on Monday that its fleet of delivery vehicles in the country will include 10,000 electric vehicles (EVs) by 2025 in India.

This commitment comes after successful pilots across different cities in 2019 — learnings from which have helped the company create scalable and long-term EV variants to build this large fleet. These EVs are in addition to the global commitment of 100,000 EVs in the delivery fleet by 2030 announced in the climate pledge signed by Amazon.

With the introduction of EVs, Amazon India aims to reduce carbon emissions and environmental impact of delivery operations. The fleet of 10,000 EVs will include three-wheelers and four-wheelers, which have been designed and manufactured in India. In 2020, these vehicles will operate in over 20 cities of India — Delhi National Capital Region, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Pune, Nagpur, and Coimbatore; this number will continue to grow.

“At Amazon India, we are committed to building a supply chain that will minimise the environmental impact of our operations. The expansion of our EV fleet to 10,000 vehicles by 2025 is an integral milestone in our journey to become an energy-efficient leader in the industry,” said Akhil Saxena, vice-president, customer fulfillment-Asia Pacific & Emerging Markets, Amazon. “We will continue to invest in the electrification of our delivery fleet, thereby reducing our dependence on non-renewable resources.”

Amazon India said it has been working with several Indian original equipment manufacturers to build a fleet of vehicles that ensure sustainable and safe deliveries of customer orders. Significant progress in the Indian e-mobility industry in the past few years has led to advanced technology, and superior motor and battery components.

In addition, the company said the government’s focus to encourage the adoption of EVs in the country, and steps towards setting up of charging infrastructure with the FAME 2 (Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and EVs) policy has helped the company accelerate and chart its vision for EVs in India.

The launch of EVs is another step towards the overall sustainability commitment at Amazon India. In September 2019, the company announced its plan to eliminate single-use plastic in its packaging from Amazon India’s fulfillment centres by June 2020, among other initiatives to reduce packaging waste.

Amazon India said it has also invested in energy conservation and solar power generation in its fulfillment centres and sort centres, with advanced building energy management systems, and water conservation methods to make operations more sustainable.

In September 2019, Amazon became the first signatory of the climate pledge, which states that the company will be net-zero carbon by 2040 across its businesses — a decade ahead of the Paris Accord’s goal of 2050.

By joining the climate pledge and agreeing to decarbonise on a faster time horizon, signatories will play a critical role in stimulating investment in the development of low carbon products and services that will be required to help companies meet the pledge.
 

As part of the pledge, globally, Amazon announced its plans to introduce 10,000 of EVs into its delivery fleet in 2022 and 100,000 vehicles by 2030 — saving 4 million metric tonnes of carbon per year by 2030.

Going green

Amazon India’s sustainability initiatives

• All plastic dunnage across the fulfillment network has been replaced with 100% recyclable paper cushions
• Single-use plastic used for packaging will be eliminated from the fulfilment centers  by June 2020
• All packaging material in the form of corrugate boxes and paper dunnage is biodegradable
• To reduce packaging waste, Packaging Free Shipment  has now expanded to  14 cities within a year
• 8 fulfilment centers and 2 sortation centers are  solar-powered and produced close to 10 Mw of energy in 2019 to run operations in the buildings
• Across facilities, an advanced energy management system provides building operators with a dashboard that enables them to optimise energy use and identify opportunities for further savings