The US Postal Service (USPS) announced on Tuesday that it intends to purchase 9,250 Ford (FN) E-Transit battery electric cars beginning later this year, as well as an equivalent number of Stellantis versions with gasoline engines.
In addition, USPS announced that it had placed an order for more than 14,000 charging stations to be installed at its facilities after announcing in December that it would more than double its anticipated purchases of electric delivery vehicles and would buy at least 66,000 of them by the end of 2028.
As part of a $430 billion climate plan passed by Congress in August, USPS received $3 billion to purchase electric cars and charging infrastructure.
In order to meet its urgent vehicle needs, USPS also announced that it would purchase 9,250 Ram ProMaster vans from Stellantis, the parent company of Chrysler, for the 2023 and 2024 model years.
According to USPS, the contracts with Ford and Stellantis totaled $1.027 billion.
Earthjustice, an environmental organization, hailed the Ford purchase but added “the Postal Service should have finished its environmental review before also sinking millions in funding in the same number of combustion mail trucks that will pollute our neighborhoods for decades.”
President Joe Biden issued an executive order in December 2021 mandating that light-duty cars purchased by the government be emission-free by 2027. The Postal Service, a separate federal agency, was exempt from that order.
Beginning in December, Ford EVs will start to be delivered. They are among the 21,000 vehicles planned for the USPS in December.
