Fortescue and Liebherr have acquired expressions of curiosity for lots of extra of the electrical model of the T 264 truck that they developed collectively, Forrest instructed Reuters in an interview in New York.
The 240-tonne capability vehicles are costlier than the roughly $5 million price ticket for big diesel mining vehicles. Fortescue and Liebherr, which teamed up in 2022 to develop the vehicles, haven’t detailed the worth of the electrical model.
The 2 corporations signed a $2.8 billion partnership on Wednesday to provide 360 of the vehicles to Fortescue, 3 times as many because the 120 deliberate underneath the preliminary partnership. They’d additionally provide 55 electrical excavators and 60 battery-powered dozers. The automobiles they’ve developed can be made obtainable for different companies, the businesses stated on Wednesday.
Fortescue builds the drive trains and batteries, which it developed, whereas Liebherr gives the truck, Forrest stated.
“They’re extra dependable and extra productive than diesel vehicles,” he stated.
“That’s our holy grail, that we are able to tackle the fossil gas vehicles with our first version. That’s not a foul end result. Instantly aggressive.”
The corporate has additionally developed a option to totally cost the massive vehicles in half-hour, he stated. The expertise was scaled up from the expertise used to cost digital racing automobiles utilized in Formulation E, he stated.
Fortescue is saving $300 million to $400 million per yr on gas prices already from battery-powered vehicles in its fleet, Forrest stated.
Gas and vitality prices are the most important working prices for Fortescue, he stated. Eliminating a few of these prices would assist the corporate climate structural modifications within the iron ore market, he stated.
Iron ore costs are hovering close to two-year lows plumbed earlier this month round $91 a tonne as extra provide comes on line amid prime purchaser China’s financial slowdown.
Gas can also be one of many firm’s greatest emissions sources. Fortescue’s mining fleet consumed about 450 million litres of diesel in FY24, accounting for 51% of its scope 1 carbon emissions.
Fortescue has been exploring numerous methods to provide inexperienced iron metallic. The corporate ultimately needs to transform all its iron ore into inexperienced iron, Forrest stated, declining to say when it would meet that concentrate on.
There can be sturdy demand for inexperienced iron from metal vegetation in China, Japan, South Korea and Europe, he stated.
“They’ll take it immediately,” he stated. “As they’ll make metal with out the air pollution.”
(By Simon Webb and Melanie Burton; Modifying by Christian Schmollinger)