Blink Charging was awarded an indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract with america Postal Service (USPS) to offer as much as 41,500 EV chargers because it transitions its supply fleet to electrical autos. 

The announcement comes solely three months after the USPS declared that it’s going to part out shopping for new inside combustion supply vans in 4 years and buy solely electrical autos after 2026. 

Final yr, the USPS introduced it was doubling its preliminary order for electrical supply vans with Oshkosh Protection costing $2.98 billion for a complete of fifty,000 models.

Then, just some weeks in the past, we realized that Ford had additionally secured a contract to offer the USPS with 9,250 E-Transit Vans.

Nevertheless, the company may also buy 9,250 Ram ProMaster vans within the subsequent two years to fill the pressing want for brand spanking new autos now. It is going to then purchase no less than 66,000 absolutely electrical autos by 2028.

The Blink contract is a gigantic win for the community nevertheless it will not be the unique provider of charging tools to the USPS. The US Postal Service introduced that it is going to be shopping for tools from two extra suppliers: Rexel Vitality Options and Siemens, and the full value of the contracts is $260 million. 

Blink has quite a lot of totally different EV charging choices and for the USPS it is going to be offering its Collection 7 dual-port charger that may provide as much as 80 amps (19.2 kW) of energy from every port.

Blink Cellular Charger

Practically three years in the past we reported that Blink was launching a cell charging resolution aimed primarily at roadside help firms. The freestanding charger was principally a gasoline-powered generator with an built-in Blink degree 2 charger connected. The unit may ship 40-amps and cost an EV at as much as 9.6 kW. 

Final week, Blink launched its second-generation gasoline-powered cell charger that’s smaller and significantly lighter (230 lbs in comparison with 354 lbs), which makes it simpler to maneuver round when wanted. It’s, nonetheless, much less highly effective than the earlier mannequin and might now ship solely 32-amps, which is 7.7 kW. Pricing hasn’t been revealed as of but. 

Blink Cellular Charger Gen 1 (Left) in comparison with Gen 2 (Proper)

Blink advertises: “The cell charger can ship as much as 1 mile of cost per minute”, however at 7.7 kW, the car would want to attain practically 8 miles per kWh so as to add a mile a minute, which isn’t even near what any manufacturing automotive can declare. Nevertheless, electrical bikes can obtain that, and even higher, so maybe Blink was referring to electrical bike charging. 

The charger can run for five hours constantly with out filling its 6.1-gallon fuel tank at its peak supply output of 32-amps. It comes with a 23-foot cable and J1772 connector so it could actually cost any electrical car offered in North America together with Tesla autos with a J1772 to Tesla adapter. 

The unit can both stay non-networked or be networked by way of Wi-Fi. The non-networked configuration permits roadside help firms with out authorization and the networked configuration permits EV drivers to pay to cost from it by their Blink account and pay for the electrical energy acquired.

Whereas utilizing a gasoline generator is not the perfect setup for cell EV charging, there’s positively a necessity for the sort of tools. Personally, I would choose to see battery-powered cell chargers and I consider that would be the way forward for cell charging. Nevertheless, I can positively perceive why roadside help autos would possibly choose this resolution, no less than till battery-powered models like these are smaller, lighter, and cheaper. 

Ideas? Go away them within the remark part under for dialogue.