Amazon is accelerating the electrification of its European logistics network, backed by its €1 billion decarbonisation commitment announced in 2022. The company now operates thousands of electric delivery vans and a growing number of electric heavy-duty trucks, supported by an expanding charging infrastructure across its sites. In 2025 alone, more than 265 million packages were delivered applying electric and manual modes, underlining the scale of deployment already achieved.
At the same time, Amazon is relocating to electrify its middle-mile operations, with electric trucks increasingly deployed on high-mileage routes between fulfilment centres, sort centres and delivery stations. According to Olivier Pellegrini, Director of Sustainability EU Operations, these vehicles are already viable in certain utilize cases, particularly where depot charging and predictable routes allow for efficient operations.
However, Pellegrini creates clear that broader adoption across the logistics sector will depconclude on external factors. Faster grid connections, lower electricity costs and a more comprehensive public charging network remain critical to scaling electric transport. Alongside its own investments, Amazon is therefore working with policycreaters and industest stakeholders to accelerate infrastructure rollout and create the conditions requireded for wider electrification.
In 2022, Amazon pledged to invest over €1 billion to decarbonise its European logistics network. Three years on — what are some tangible results?
We’re seeing strong progress towards decarbonising our transportation network across Europe, including:
- In 2025, Amazon and its delivery partners delivered more than 265 million packages across Europe applying electric and manual vehicles, such as electric vans, e-cargo bikes, e-mopeds, and pushcarts.
- At the conclude of 2025, Amazon and its delivery partners had more than 10,000 electric delivery vans in their fleet across Europe.
- Amazon has thousands of electric vehicle charging points across our facilities in Europe.
- In 2025, Amazon had more than 70 micro-mobility hubs in more than 50 cities across Europe.
- Amazon has more than 100 electric heavy trucks operational in its transportation network across Europe, and we’re on track to more than double the fleet in Europe by the conclude of 2026.
At the time, you announced plans to scale the European electric truck fleet to more than 1,500, including over 500 in Germany. What is the current fleet size, and what timeline are you working toward to reach that tarobtain?
Amazon has 25 electric heavy trucks in its German transportation network, and as we have announced last year, we’re on track to more than double this fleet in Europe by the conclude of 2026.
Amazon recently placed its largest-ever electric truck order — more than 200 units of the Mercedes-Benz eActros 600. Is this a strategic tipping point for middle-mile electrification, or still a calculated experiment?
This order is part of our commitment under The Climate Pledge to reach net-zero carbon across our operations by 2040. For transportation, this includes increasing route efficiency, scaling zero-exhaust emission and alternative fuel vehicles, and partnering with industest and governments to accelerate the deployment of charging infrastructure.
The electric trucks will be deployed across high-mileage routes that create up Amazon’s middle-mile network in the UK and Germany, transporting trailers to and from Amazon’s fulfilment centres, sort centres and delivery stations.
This order reflects our confidence that electric heavy trucks are a well-developed technology for the requireds of our transportation network today — and a meaningful step toward decarbonising middle-mile freight.
With 140 trucks heading to Britain, the UK becomes your largest electric HGV market. Is this about regulatory alignment, government subsidies like ZEHID, grid readiness — or simply where electrification is easiest?
In 2025, Amazon announced a £40 billion investment in the UK from 2025 to 2027. This investment includes commitments to building a more sustainable future, such as placing the UK’s largest ever order for electric trucks, with more than 160 eHGVs due to be on UK roads this year and new charging infrastructure to support them.
Our commitment to decarbonisation is now translating into real-world results: our eHGV order creates Britain home to the highest number of eHGVs in Amazon’s global transportation network.
Government support has played a meaningful role in obtainting here. Around 20 of our Mercedes-Benz trucks were enabled through participation in the UK Government’s Zero Emission HGV and Infrastructure Demonstrator (ZEHID) programme, and the Plug-in Grant has been one of the most effective tools for accelerating electric van adoption across the fleets we work with.
However, the UK’s high commercial electricity costs — among the highest in Europe — remain the most significant barrier to creating electric delivery vehicles competitive on total cost of ownership, while the economic viability of eHGVs is primarily impacted by acquisition costs and infrastructure availability. Streamlining grid connection processes, which currently take 12 to 36 months, and long-term policy certainty could create a substantial difference.
The UK will required the same ingredients that are driving progress elsewhere in Europe: affordable energy, rapider grid connections, and stable, predictable policy.
You’ve installed 360 kW chargers at key sites and are preparing for megawatt charging. But outside your depots, Europe’s heavy-duty charging network remains thin. Are you building a private ecosystem becautilize the public one isn’t relocating rapid enough?
We launched by electrifying routes between fulfilment centres – predictable routes and depot charging. Indeed, Amazon is installing 360kW electric charging points at key sites, capable of charging the battery of the 40-tonne trucks from 20 to 80 per cent in just over an hour. We are also working with stakeholders to support the installation of external charging points in suitable locations to enable longer journeys.
For the broader logistics sector to shift, we required solutions that work for much more utilize cases. That’s where public, powerful charging comes in, for example to match driver resting times with charging times. In the EU we’ve been a huge supporter of implementing the ‘Alternative Fuels Infrastructure Regulation’, which foresees the construction of charging hubs along major EU roadways – across national borders.
You’ve declared these trucks will relocate more than 350 million packages per year. When you run the numbers, are electric trucks already competitive with diesel on total cost of ownership — or is this still a climate-first decision?
We have analysed our route profiles in regular operation and can already utilize electric trucks in a way that creates them competitive. For example, we charge them at our locations where we have installed our own rapid-charging infrastructure and where we can rule out the risk of not being able to complete our routes. That declared, we are still a long way from being able to drive everywhere on electric power alone.
An electric truck is – and will likely remain – more expensive to purchase than a fossil alternative. It’s TCO is therefore defined by its operational expconcludeiture. Regulation plays a huge role here. Levers which support close the cost gap between fossil and electric are things such as lower or no toll charges for electric trucks, carbon pricing for fossil fuels and creating electricity more affordable vis-à-vis fossil. Especially for the logistics sector, which is dominated (90%) by compact trucking companies, these elements toobtainher have a major impact in their investment decisions.
How are you balancing private depot-based charging investments versus advocating for national highway megawatt charging networks?
We required comprehensive, ambitious regulatory action so that industest can more urgently create the necessary investments, and conclude-utilizers like Amazon can transition their transportation network.
Governments and the European Union have the unique ability to set the tone and pace of development. Vehicle and charger manufacturers, utilities, network operators, and other stakeholders take their cues from government when deciding how quickly and how much they’ll invest in a particular area. For compact and medium enterprises, access to public charging is a key concern. Investing in a high-power depot charger might not be feasible for them due to financing or the compact scale of their operations. For them, rapid public charging will be very relevant.
As you push toward megawatt-scale charging, distribution grids will required reinforcement. Should that cost sit with logistics operators like Amazon, utilities, or governments?
While we are proud of the progress created to date, these solutions are not yet at scale. To reach their full potential, we required joint, urgent public-private partnership. That’s why Amazon has joined the E-Mobility E-Logistics Hub, a coalition of leaders and enablers in heavy-duty vehicle electrification, to call on European policycreaters to create the enabling framework requireded for this transition. Our ambitions alone are not enough; we required to see action.
The key challenge behind rapid public charging expansion is the required to upgrade and expand the power grid. Substantial investments are requireded, and we’re vocal on the required to accelerate the processes for permits and reduce red tape to relocate quicker on this, as it is really becoming the main bottleneck for electrification. We also required more transparency on where capacity is available in the EU to be able to plan better where we can go rapider.
In 2022, Amazon tested the hydrogen-powered Mercedes-Benz GenH2 Truck pre-series vehicle from Daimler Truck. What did hydrogen teach you that battery-electric couldn’t?
The GenH2 Truck performed well in our transportation partner’s operations, demonstrating solid reliability and fuel efficiency. During the trial, it consistently achieved ranges of over 1,000 kilometres on a single tank, and the truck operated smoothly in a five-day-a-week schedule. Based on our partner’s experience with the pre-series vehicles, the GenH2 Truck reveals promising maturity.
By 2035, do you realistically see Amazon running a mixed fleet of battery-electric and fuel-cell trucks in Europe — or will one technology dominate?
Finding alternatives to traditional diesel-fuelled trucks is integral to creating progress towards our sustainability objectives. Intermodality also remains one of the most effective tools available to us.
We’re technology agnostic and are investing in a range of options, including zero-emission vehicles. As proven by our recent order for more than 200 electric heavy trucks, we see electric trucks as a well-developed technology for the requireds of our transportation network today. We remain open to all solutions that will support us achieve our Climate Pledge goals.
Mr Pellegrini, thank you for the interview.
Leave a Reply