IKEA To Electrify Last-Mile Delivery In Canada With Lion Electric

IKEA and its last-mile delivery partner in Canada, Second Closet, will deploy 15 all-electric Lion Electric trucks this fall in Canada.

The vehicles making deliveries for IKEA Canada will operate in Bocherville, Quebec; Etobicoke, Ontario; and Richmond, British Columbia. They are Lion6 heavy-duty zero-emission vehicles and will play a significant role in IKEA's broader sustainability effort, the company said.

"Electrifying our last mile delivery service is an important step in our journey to become climate positive by 2030, especially with the rapid acceleration of our online business over the past year," said Michael Ward, CEO and chief sustainability officer of IKEA Canada. "We are pleased to work with Second Closet and Lion Electric, two great Canadian innovators, to support us in meeting our customers' [needs] with people and planet in mind."

IKEA said the vehicles will help it achieve 20% of its zero-emission delivery goals. The Swedish retailer has set a 2030 goal of becoming a circular and climate-positive business through a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.

The announcement comes less than a month after IKEA announced plans to convert its New York and Los Angeles delivery fleets to electric vehicles (EVs). Once fully deployed, IKEA's New York operations will operate with 40 EVs. In the Los Angeles area, the first trucks will be delivered to Burbank, followed by Covina and Costa Mesa. IKEA U.S. did not provide a timetable for the Los Angeles deployment.

The U.S. trucks will be provided by Fluid Truck, an online vehicle rental platform that operates under a truck-sharing business model. Ingka Investments, the investment arm of IKEA parent company Ingka Group, is a minority shareholder in Fluid Truck through an unspecified investment made earlier this month. The New York fleet is currently composed of Lightning eMotors Electric Class 4 commercial box trucks and Workhorse C1000 trucks, IKEA U.S. said.

In Canada, IKEA said it produces four times the energy that the company's operations and facilities consume thanks to renewable energy from its wind farms and rooftop solar panels. However, its transportation network is still in need of greening as its home deliveries have exploded — growing 30% year-over-year to more than 500,000 deliveries in 2020.

Related:

Read: IKEA's NYC last-mile delivery fleet to be fully electric by May

Read: Lion Electric to go public in SPAC merger

Second Closet provides fulfillment and storage solutions for businesses in Canada. The trucks will be purchased by Second Closet and co-branded with IKEA Canada.

"A key area of focus for Second Closet is ensuring both the quality and sustainability of our processes. In addition to making this important investment in electric vehicles for our fleet, we have also retrofitted our facilities with highly energy-efficient lighting and have a circular supply chain for our corrugated boxes and other consumable materials," said Mark Ang, CEO and co-founder of Second Closet. "We are pleased to be working closely with IKEA Canada and Lion and look forward to seeing these trucks on the road making deliveries."

The Lion6 is a Class 6 electric truck designed for urban driving. Its electric powertrain produces up to 470 horsepower and 2,500 pounds-foot of torque.

"Lion is delighted to have been chosen as a key partner in IKEA Canada's incredibly ambitious goal of decarbonizing home delivery by 2025. We believe this will be the first deployment of all-electric delivery trucks at scale in Canada, serving as an example for what's possible with electrified fleets today and setting up IKEA Canada and Second Closet for larger deployments in the near future," said Marc Bedard, CEO and founder of Lion.

Lion also has orders for its vehicles from Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN and for 50 Lion8s from CN for its intermodal operation. The company is awaiting final approval from Northern Genesis Acquisition Corp. NGA stockholders for a planned special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger. The Quebec-based manufacturer expects to raise about $500 million from the transaction.

Alternative-power vehicle makers Hyliion Holdings Corp. HYLN and Nikola Corp. NKLA have also taken the SPAC route to a public listing in recent months.

Click for more Modern Shipper articles by Brian Straight.

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