Give the U.S. Postal Service $3 Billion to Electrify Its Fleet, You Cowards

The United States Postal Service ’s trucks are in dire need of replacement , and the agency has a program to do just that . Last class , it announce its plans to move forward topurchase the mail hand truck of the future .

of late last calendar week , it detail those plans more to the full in anenvironmental shock instruction , sussing out a few different scenario . One included transition all 165,000 of its everyday workhorse fleet to electric vehicle . But in the remnant , the USPS decided that was n’t its preferent pick , alternatively saying it would like 10 % of its new fleet to be electric while the remaining 90 % will run on internal combustion engines .

There are challenge to the 100 % EV option , include where to install charge infrastructure in urban locations and having the range for mail delivery in rural areas . But the principal reason the USPS prefers the 90/10 schism is cost . It called the 100 % galvanising truck scenario its “ preferred choice , ” but observe that it “ is not manageable , absentminded additional funding . ” The full price to wire the fleet wholly would be $ 11.6 billion , a $ 3.3 billion difference from the 90/10 rip . To which I say , why has nobody give the Postal Service this money yet ?

Imagine it’s electric.

Imagine it’s electric.Image: USPS

you could plausibly find the $ 3.3 billion sit in the Joint Chiefs of Staff ’s corporate lounge cushions . conceive that the F-35 , a $ 1.5 trillion boondoggle of a belligerent jet thatcan’t even shoot straight . If the Department of Defense isreally seriousabout national security threat position by mood change , it must immediately cancel , I do n’t know , one or two F-35 contract and give that money to the USPS . give birth 165,000 electric vehicle quietly give up post would , agree to the EIS , contract nursery gasoline emissions by more than 537,000 metrical net ton of direct tailpipe emissions alone . The USPS helpful notes this would “ be the most beneficial ” scenario on that front , in addition to dilute air and noise pollution . That would pull through lives and money , in particular in poor neighborhoods andcommunities of color . Can the F-35 program say the same ?

But OK , I hear you . Canceling a few Lockheed Martin contract bridge would be distinctly un - American . We love the military - industrial composite ! So then it must be incumbent on Congress to get its act together . Specifically , the Build Back Better Act , which includedroughly $ 6 billionfor the USPS and electrification . A relative princely inwardness compared to what the government agency outlined in its EIS !

Yet the act waskilled by Sen. Joe Manchinlive on Fox News belatedly last twelvemonth . The senator from West Virginiahas since saidthat he could come to an agreement with his fellow Democrats on mood “ much easy than anything else . ” What dear way to prove that he is not a speculative organized religion negotiant have by extra pastime than by voting for Build Back advantageously and see to it the USPS has its extra $ 3.3 billion to get that EV fleet seethe ? Manchin hasspoken highlyof the Postal Service , even advocate bipartisan comity to pay back delays . Maybe he can even peel off a few Republicans to modernize mail delivery .

Jblclip5

The joy of see those cute trucks zipping around to deliver mail to his grammatical constituent , gratis of exhaust , should be incentive enough to get to yes . After all , West Virginia has thethird - highest bronchial asthma rateof any state in the U.S. But as an act of good will , the USPS could even earmark Manchin to name one of its unexampled EVs , much like Michigan reserve the public to do with itssnowplows .

There are still other ways to get the USPS a few extra bucks . see Sen. Elizabeth Warren’swealth tax legislation , which would task the holdings with more than $ 1 billion at 3 % . employ that to Jeff Bezos ’ $ 177 billion luck alone , and boom , $ 5.4 billion for sweet , sweet electron volt . We can use the rest of $ 2.1 billion to , I do n’t know , plant some community garden on post office attribute .

All this would align with President Joe Biden ’s executive order onelectrifying the Union vehicle fleetand throwing the weight of government behind address the climate crisis . In myopic , there is no reason not to give the USPS the money to do this . Give them the additional $ 3.3 billion .

Ugreentracker