How bott is helping the water industry master the challenges of electrification

What started out as a visionary idea just over a year ago, has seen the roll-out of a strong collaboration in the fleet industry with the desire to embrace the future of van electrification. Spearheaded by Elaine Pringle, fleet manager at Scottish Water, the Water UK Fleet Forum partnered with bott, Farizon and MICHELIN Connected Fleet to create a real-world test of the Farizon SV which has now been rolled out across a number of water companies within the forum.

Thanks to the flexibility of Farizon, bott was allowed to spec out the van and provide a bespoke conversion through its bott vario3 solution. The needs of the water industry were understood and tailored to accordingly whilst the modular capability has meant the differing requirements of the companies within the forum were met. The trial that started with Scottish Water in August last year has since moved on to Northumbrian Water, Yorkshire Water, United Utilities and Anglian Water with the next excited recipients to be Wessex Water followed by South West Water.

Whilst there are many operational similarities between these fleets, the terrains and driving conditions greatly differ so this has been an excellent test of the differing and collective demands and benefits from a range, battery performance and payload demands. As with all good trials, clear metrics are in place to measure the key indicators and, through the support of MICHELIN Connected Fleet's real-time monitoring and reporting capabilities across range, charging behaviour, vehicle utilisation and driving performance, the early indications are that there has been much to learn and build on as a result.

bott provided the solution free of charge in the interests of developing solutions in collaboration with this critical utilities industry. bott’s developing strategy has seen them demonstrate how they understand operators’ worlds deeply enough to design, build and deliver solutions that go far beyond racking, reinforced by its fleet positioning of “your operation, we help you master it”. As the trial nears its conclusion, there will be a great deal of best practice and insights to share which will help the industry as it embraces the importance of the collective need to embrace an EV future.