Food carts are a staple of New York City dining, dispensing everything from dosa and doner kebabs to dogs and dim sum in short order. But no matter how enticing the aroma of a cart\u2019s food, the smelly gas generators that keep the lights on threaten to put customers off their meals.<\/p>\n
Cart owners and customers may not have to suck on fumes much longer. A Brooklyn-based startup is testing the use of its e-bike batteries to power food carts, starting with La Chona Mexican on the corner of 30th<\/sup> and Broadway in Manhattan.<\/p>\n \u201cThis really started out as a lark last summer,\u201d David Hammer, co-founder and CEO of PopWheels, told TechCrunch. \u201cI\u2019m an ex-Googler from the early days, and this felt like a classic, old-school 20% project.\u201d<\/p>\n Normally, PopWheels battery packs are zipping around the city strapped to food delivery bikes. The team soon realized that connecting them to food carts was an avenue worth pursuing.<\/p>\n \u201cAre e-bike packs the perfect energy type to be powering food carts? Maybe, maybe not,\u201d Hammer said. \u201cI would argue it doesn\u2019t matter. What matters is, can you solve distribution and charging?\u201d<\/p>\n PopWheels currently operates 30 charging cabinets around Manhattan, which serve gig workers riding e-bikes, most of whom use either Arrow or Whizz models. That\u2019s resulted in a \u201cde facto\u00a0 decentralized fleet,\u201d Hammer said, allowing the company to stock just a few different types of batteries to serve hundreds of customers.<\/p>\n Many delivery workers ride into Manhattan from the farther reaches of the city. It\u2019s a trip that can burn a significant portion of their charge, and many workers need two batteries to get through a full day. In response, bodegas started offering e-bike charging services, for which delivery workers typically pay $100 per month. When factoring in battery wear and tear, the total cost nears $2,000 per year, Hammer said.<\/p>\n Techcrunch event<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSan Francisco<\/span> \u201cWe can make the economics work so that we\u2019re actually saving them money right off the bat,\u201d he said. PopWheels charges customers $75 per month for unlimited access to its network, and Hammer said the company has a long waitlist.<\/p>\n The startup\u2019s charging cabinets can hold 16 batteries, and PopWheels designed them to swiftly extinguish a battery fire should anything go awry during charging. (The company\u2019s founding mission was to stamp out e-bike fires in New York City, which became a significant problem few years ago.) After building some initial cabinets, the company raised a $2.3 million seed round last year 2025.<\/p>\n Swap sites are typically small open spaces like parking lots, which PopWheels has retrofit with fences and the necessary electrical connections to support several cabinets. Each cabinet draws about as much electricity as a Level 2 electric vehicle charger, which is to say not that much.<\/p>\n As PopWheels e-bike service grew, the startup began studying other opportunities.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere was always a little bit of an underlying thesis that there\u2019s something bigger here,\u201d Hammer said. \u201cIf you build urban-scale, fire-safe battery swapping infrastructure, you\u2019re creating an infrastructure layer that lots of people are going to want to get on board with.\u201d<\/p>\n Hammer started to think about alternative uses for the batteries after someone sent an article about how New York City was working to decarbonize food carts. That\u2019s when the PopWheels team started running the numbers.<\/p>\n Food carts, Hammer estimates, probably spend around $10 a day on gas for their generators to keep the lights on. (Most of the cooking is done via propane, which is a separate matter.) That\u2019s about how much PopWheels would charge someone to subscribe to four of its batteries per day. Conveniently, four of its batteries can supply about five kilowatt-hours of electricity, which is enough to cover the low end of what a typical cart might draw. If they need more juice, Hammer said they can run to a swap station midday.<\/p>\n After realizing the math penciled out, PopWheels built a prototype adapter and trialed it at a small event at the Brooklyn Navy Yard at last year\u2019s New York Climate Week. Since then, the startup has been working with the the non-profit Street Vendor Project to move the idea forward. Last week\u2019s demonstration with La Chona was the first time the batteries powered a food cart for a full day.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI had multiple food cart owners come up to me and say, \u2018Wait, there\u2019s no noise with this cart. What are you guys doing? Can I get this?\u2019\u201d Hammer said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe are planning to roll this out aggressively starting this summer,\u201d he said. \u201cWe think we could be cost neutral with gasoline for a food cart owner while solving all of the quality of life issues.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/popwheels-swapping-batteries-food-cart.jpg?w=680\")
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOctober 13-15, 2026<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n