Charging needs for electric semi-trailer trucks

Geographical Modeling of Charging Infrastructure Requirements for Heavy-Duty Electric Autonomous Truck Operations

“…(a) (b) From the data analysis, we can see that there is a strong correlation between trip distances, trip durations, and the off-shift periods between the fleet DNA and the estimates From the data analysis, we can see that there is a strong correlation between trip distances, trip durations, and the off-shift periods between the fleet DNA and the estimates From the data analysis, we can see that there is a strong correlation between trip distances, trip durations, and the off-shift periods between the fleet DNA and the estimates detailed in [10,11]. Most trips are <300 miles in the distance, and most vehicles are in operation for <10 h in the day, indicating that the dataset explored is diverse and truly representative of fleet operations in the U.S. [18] and delivered fully electric heavy-duty trucks [19][20][21], and many tech upstarts and incumbents have developed autonomous driver software [22][23][24][25], the combination of both technologies has not gained wide adoption as yet.…”

“…Texas is the second largest state in the U.S., with a population of about 27 million people, with nearly three-quarters of the population living within the so-called "Texas Triangle", bordered by three major highways: I-35, I-45 and I-10, and linking the major cities of Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, and San Antonio [27]. Figure 4 detailed in [10,11]. Most trips are <300 miles in the distance, and most vehicles are in operation for <10 h in the day, indicating that the dataset explored is diverse and truly representative of fleet operations in the U.S.…”

“…Another study by NREL leveraged scale vehicle telematics data (>205 million miles of driving) of diesel-based semi-trailer fleets to estimate charging behaviors and infrastructure requirements for the U.S. battery-electric semi-trailer trucks within three main operating segments: local, regional, and long-haul. Their finding suggests that existing charging standards (≤350 kW) meet the charging requirements for 35 to 77% of the total energy demand for local trips with an operating radius (OR) ≤ 100 miles and regional trips with 100 miles ≤ OR ≤ 300 miles [11]. This assessment, again, was based on charging availability time windows due to the long dwell times of semi-trailers in these segments, which averaged 16.9 h/veh/day and 15.2 h/veh/day for local and regional truck segments, respectively.…”

Road to zero: Research and industry perspectives on zero-emission commercial vehicles

“…Although BEVs carry an advantage over FCEVs in terms of overall efficiency and technology readiness, recent studies show that further improvements to battery range, charging speeds, and gravimetric energy densities will be needed to enable long-haul BEVs to operate similarly to diesel trucks today. 24 , 25 , 26 Use of BEVs for long-haul operations is likely to require charging at the megawatt-level scale, and significant infrastructure investments, both in terms of cost, deployment time, and grid implications. The Charging Interface Initiative (CharIN) is expected to release the Megawatt Charging System standard in 2024 to create a common solution for high-power charging of commercial vehicles.…”

“…Borlaug et al. 24 show that even heavy-duty freight trucks are off-shift and potentially available to depot or opportunity charge for an average of 14–17 h per day. On the other hand, there will be a need for “en route fast charging,” similar to existing liquid (and potential future hydrogen) fueling stations, where a vehicle’s shift is interrupted to charge as quickly as possible (multiple hundreds of kilowatts to megawatt-level charging).…”