Over the past two years, San Francisco startup Ample Inc. has quietly deployed more than a dozen robotic battery-swap stations around the Bay Area and in Europe.

Whether battery-swapping becomes a more mainstream alternative to charging in the U.S. depends, in part, on more automakers working with companies like Ample.

Change to the hidden health and climate cost of consumer goods carried by tens of thousands of drayage trucks is coming in the form of more widely-accessible electric alternatives.