As a part of CALSTART's Hybrid Truck Users Forum Hybrid Refuse Truck Working Group program, three new hybrid garbage trucks were manufactured with funding assistance from the U.S. Army National Automotive Center. The garbage trucks were built by Crane Carrier, include both electric and hydraulic hybrid configurations, and were put into service for the New York City Department of Sanitation.
The electric hybrid's drivetrain was supplied by ISE, and is a series hybrid configuration using a diesel engine to drive a generator providing electricity to an ultracapacitor energy storage pack. The hydraulic hybrid's drivetrain was supplied by Bosch Rexroth. The U.S. Army NAC provided funding for the garbage trucks to encourage the continuous development of commercially viable hybrid drive systems in order to reduce the cost of future hybrid drive systems. Future hybrid drive systems that are more cost-effective than current solutions would prove quite beneficial to the U.S. military.
Image courtesy of CALSTART.