UPS may put its fleet on a diet by replacing the traditional sheet aluminium truck with one made of plastic. Plastic trucks use less fuel and can be recycled when they reach the end of their life.
Body panels for these new UPS trucks will be made of ABS plastic and will lighten a typical vehicle by a whopping 450kg. A lighter truck can be outfitted with a smaller, more fuel-efficient engine. Each plastic truck should get about 6km to the litre. Yeah, that’s not great compared to your typical hybrid electric car, but UPS estimates it still can save over 317 million litres of fuel each year. Their fuel costs will go down and we get to breathe some cleaner air. Best of all, the ABS plastic could be scavenged from retired trucks and recycled into other products. [Fast Company]