01 — Scope
Quote
We come to your depot. We look at your trucks, your TRU model, your routes, and your duty cycle. We send you a quote with a clear month-one savings estimate.
For South African cold-chain fleets running Carrier Transicold
Take diesel off your refrigerated trucks.
The Elmech eTRU is a fully electric refrigeration unit that replaces the diesel engine on your Carrier Transicold reefer. Same cold cargo, same routes — without the fuel, the noise, or the maintenance.
Twenty years of solar engineering, now on the road. Built by Elmech (Pty) Ltd in Mossel Bay — designing and installing solar power systems across South Africa since 2005.
Estimate your fleet's savings
See what an Elmech eTRU could save on your fleet.
Annual diesel displaced · fleet
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Annual rand savings · fleet
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Indicative only. Your monthly portal report shows the figures measured on your own fleet.
The cost of diesel refrigeration
Every refrigerated trip burns fuel twice.
Every refrigerated truck on the road today has two engines. The one that moves the truck — and a second, smaller diesel engine that runs the refrigeration unit. That second engine runs every hour the cargo needs to stay cold — on the road and parked at the depot overnight — and the amount of diesel it burns depends on the Carrier unit installed and the cargo profile.
It is also the engine you maintain twice as often, the one that fails in summer, and the one your drivers cannot switch off when they pull into a residential delivery at 5 a.m.
The product
A fully electric refrigeration unit, built in Mossel Bay.
The Elmech eTRU replaces the diesel engine on your existing refrigeration unit with a battery-powered system. Solar panels on the trailer roof top up the batteries during the day. At the depot, the unit charges from the grid overnight. The cargo stays at temperature; the diesel pump stays off.
Every unit is designed, built, and commissioned by Elmech around a proven stack of battery, solar, inverter, and control components — the same engineering behind two decades of solar installations in South Africa.
The eTRU is built around Carrier Transicold units. Support for Thermo King and Zanotti is on the roadmap — talk to us if you run a mixed fleet.
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Solar panels (rooftop)
Top up the batteries while you drive.
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LiFePO₄ (lithium iron phosphate) battery bank
Stores enough energy to run a full shift.
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Inverter + charge ctrl
Manages power flow between sources.
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Edge controller
Talks to your existing TRU unit.
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eTRU portal
Shows you exactly how much diesel you stopped burning.
From order to running cold
On your fleet in about three weeks.
Four discrete steps from the first depot visit to the first trip on battery power.
02 — Build
Workshop
Once you accept, we build the eTRU at our workshop in Mossel Bay. Lead time is about three weeks, subject to truck availability.
03 — Install
Fitting
We fit the unit to your truck — solar panels, battery bank, inverter, and the edge controller that talks to your existing TRU. No replacement of the refrigeration unit itself.
04 — Run
First trip
Your driver pulls away. From the first trip, you can see the diesel you no longer burn, every month, on the eTRU portal.
What the eTRU delivers
Measured. Reported. Audit-ready.
~40 L / day*
Example diesel displaced per unit, per day
R900–1 400 / day*
Net fuel savings per unit, reported monthly
−18 °C
Continuous HACCP-grade cargo logging
5 years
Product warranty on the eTRU
Every Elmech eTRU ships with a fleet portal that calculates diesel displacement and net savings from the unit's own telemetry, against an OEM-verified diesel-consumption model. Each unit's monthly report is audit-ready.
See how we verify the savings →*Example only. Actual diesel displaced and rand savings will differ based on daily run-hours and the size of the carrier unit. Your monthly portal report shows the figures measured on your own fleet.
Installed unit
eTRU.x — first unit, in service since April 2026.
Reference fleet
First reference fleet to be announced. Reach out if you would like to be among the first.
Certifications
Certifications to be confirmed with the Elmech engineering team before publication.
About Elmech
Twenty years of solar engineering — now on the road.
Elmech (Pty) Ltd is a Mossel Bay-based engineering company. We have spent the past two decades designing and installing solar power systems across South Africa. The eTRU is the application of that same engineering — battery, solar, inverter, and control — to the problem of refrigerated transport.
We are a startup in the eTRU space, but not in solar. Every unit is built and supported by the same team that has been putting battery, solar, and inverter hardware on South African rooftops since 2005.
Led by the Elmech engineering team — lead engineer name and title to be confirmed.
Tell us about your fleet.
Send us your truck type, refrigeration unit, and a typical duty cycle. We will come back with a quote and a clear month-one savings estimate.
Thanks — we have your details and will reply within one business day. If you'd prefer to follow up directly, email info@elmech-eng.com.
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