Infrastructure planning tools for medium and heavy duty fleet electrification — Buoyant’s Investment in ElectroTempo
Solving the EV Planning Problem Today, Building Toward an Electrified Tomorrow
There are approximately 22.8 million medium and heavy-duty vehicles in use in the US, the bulk of which are heavy-duty pickups and vans (49%) weighing between 8,500–14,000 pounds. Although these vehicles represent less than 10% of the car’s on the road, they contribute a disproportionate share of emissions at ~23% of the transportation sector GHG. Against a backdrop of rapid acceleration of EV adoption in the light duty/passenger vehicle segments, significant challenges still remain for medium and heavy-duty fleet electrification as there are questions of when to charge, where to charge, and what infrastructure needs to be installed or upgraded to ensure continuity and stability of the electricity grid.
At the federal level, The United States participated in the Global Memorandum of Understanding on Zero-Emission Medium and Heavy Duty Vehicles which is set to deliver on net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 with an interim goal of ~30% zero emission vehicle sales by 2030. At the state level, both New York and California lead the charge to electrification seeking to fully electrify truck and bus sales by 2045. To deliver on these goals, OEMs such as Tesla, Volvo, and Rivian have varying degrees of initiatives to deliver medium and heavy duty electric vehicles. Meanwhile, fleet owners are beginning to do the math that electrifying their fleets will lower costs over the long term with estimates that life-time EV discounted fuel and maintenance cost savings alone are between $10,000 to $250,000 based on vehicle type.
With estimates that there will be ~$12 billion of capital expenditures for charging equipment and installation expected through 2030 for EV fleet depots, it’s anticipated that electricity demand specifically from fleet depots will rise from ~12% in 2021 to ~27% in 2030.
As we consider the strains that electrification is expected to put on utilities to maintain and balance our grid, the significant expansion of high-load demand charging for electrified medium and heavy duty vehicles is creating a multi-stakeholder problem in terms of planning, collaboration, and execution. Buoyant is proud to introduce our newest investment in a leading fleet electrification software provider, ElectroTempo.
Our Investment in ElectroTempo
ElectroTempo bridges the gap between best-in-class transportation demand modeling capabilities with nuanced understanding of utility and electricity grid assets to best site and optimize charging infrastructure. With technology that addresses the unique challenges of both light duty vehicles and medium and heavy duty vehicles, ElectroTempo has positioned itself as the leading planning and modeling tool to help utilities, commercial real estate site owners and commercial vehicle fleet owners that are struggling with the cold start problem of where to begin on electrification.
ElectroTempo’s Simulation Software
ElectroTempo has built charging demand simulation capabilities from foundational research led by CEO Ann Xu. These capabilities help ensure that site and fleet owners better understand future forecasted charging demand and overlay those models with grid infrastructure information to identify areas where future reliability may be at risk. Building on that, the team created a tool for site hosts to perform analytics which prioritize the EV infrastructure needs of a given area.
With their first customer, Evolve Houston, a non-profit partnership including Shell Recharge, NRG, Centerpoint, the City of Houston, and University of Houston, ElectroTempo assessed charging demand across the Houston region and provided the consortium with the tools to evaluate not only financial implications of this demand, but critical implementation factors for EV charging infrastructure such as grid capacity and environmental justice. This work has expanded over time to include tools for property owners and fleet operators to assess their EV infrastructure needs and coordinate with utility partners to deploy EVs more rapidly and operate their fleets more efficiently.
The tailwinds presented by the Inflation Reduction Act are set to enable a broad-based expansion of clean energy mobility but not without the tooling and software to ensure that investments made today are the right ones for decades to come. ElectroTempo’s software and team have supported prospective investment to modernize infrastructure for utilities, property owners, and fleets. We expect many more multi-stakeholder policy decisions across the country to need the support of ElectroTempo tools and technology to make best use of the upswell of federal and state public, as well as private, dollars.
ElectroTempo’s World Class Team
Located in Arlington, Virginia, ElectroTempo was started by Yanzhi (Ann) Xu, Ph.D, following her research at Texas A&M focused on the intersection of transportation and energy systems. Prior to her research, Ann was a Senior Technical Advisor for Impact and Assessment at ARPA-E, establishing the IMPACTS data science platform to streamline and optimize the agency’s portfolio management. Additionally, Ann directed a $15M program focused on transportation and energy efficiency referred to as TRANSNET. Ann has her PhD from Georgia Institute of Technology in Transportation Systems Engineering and is cited in many top publications focused on transportation electrification.
Joining her in founding the company is COO Patrick Finch. Patrick worked at ARPA-E as a commercialization advisor for a range of technologies funded by the Agency. In this capacity he worked with Ann on the TRANSNET program. He has spent the bulk of his career to date at Booz Allen Hamilton supporting clients on behalf of government, utility, and non-governmental organization clients in the renewable energy, energy efficiency and built environment segments. Additionally, Patrick was an early employee at Waypoint Building Group, an energy efficiency software and consulting company for commercial real estate.
Welcome to the Buoyant Boat!
Buoyant invests in digital climate solutions including software which enables a transition to decarbonized mobility, such as ElectroTempo. Buoyant is thrilled to support a team that is addressing a real problem today with broad-based EV fleet adoption. We want to thank Buoyant’s investor, NiSource, for their help during diligence, and also Shell Ventures for their input on the market need for a solution like ElectroTempo’s. Joining us in the round of funding are incredible clean energy and digital technology investors including existing investor Schematic Ventures, as well as new investors SpringTime Ventures, ZEBOX Ventures, Virginia Venture Partners, Clean Energy Venture Group and Supply Chain Ventures. We are excited to welcome Ann, Patrick and their team into the Buoyant boat!
