Frito-Lay plans to make its Modesto, California manufacturing site, one of the company’s largest in the US, a “near zero-emission freight facility.”

A grant from the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District (aka Valley Air) will cover half of the $30.8-million cost of the project.

Frito-Lay will replace all its existing diesel-powered freight equipment at the plant with electric and alt-fuel vehicles, including 15 Tesla Semi trucks (part of an order for 100 that parent company PepsiCo placed in 2017), 6 Peterbilt 220EV electric box trucks, 3 BYD 8Y electric yard tractors, 12 Crown lithium-ion battery-electric forklifts, and 38 Volvo tractors powered by natural gas.

Tesla is also slated to supply “electric truck charging infrastructure, a large-scale solar PV system, and two energy storage systems for facility peak shaving and heavy-duty electric truck charging,” according to PepsiCo’s filing with Valley Air. PepsiCo expects the project to be completed by 2021.

“We hope this work will become an operating model for all of our facilities across the US, and that we act as the catalyst to accelerate adoption of alternative fuel vehicles across the industry,” said PepsiCo VP of Supply Chain Michael O’Connell.

Sources: Frito-Lay, Electrek