Zombie technologies of electric vehicles E-roads

This is the fourth and final article in a Halloween-themed series in which we present four technologies that display zombie characteristics

We’ve all seen it: great new technologies with huge potential from a central promise to revolutionize what we do. However, each comes with a challenging list of problems that — when viewed objectively — relegate the technology to prototype form with limited commercial value. These problems could include available technology, cost, business model, and in some cases, the basic laws of physics.

However, these problems aren’t enough to stop hardy groups of individuals from continuing their development and promotion, fuelled by the promise of fulfilling those technologies’ potential.

New Mobility is no exception. In this short series of Halloween-themed articles, James Carter and Paul Martin analyze four technologies that display zombie characteristics.

Zombie Technology 1Solar panels on cars
Zombie Technology 2Hydrogen fuel cell cars
Zombie Technology 3Wireless charging

Zombie Technology 4: E-roads

The dream 

Drive onto a road with your electric vehicle and it self-charges through the road infrastructure, similar to an electric train or streetcar. This gives a vehicle an infinite range only limited by the infrastructure available. Drawing electricity straight from road infrastructure allows for much smaller batteries, thereby reducing vehicle weight and improving heavy duty load capacity.

How it works 

E-road infrastructure proposals usually take one of three forms: a wireless charging system embedded in the road; electrical contacts also built into the road surface, or an overhead catenary system with an electrical power contact (like a tram or streetcar). Some extend this dream by adding solar panels along the road, or even making them part of the road surface.

Why it should die (or how it could live)

The three types of e-roads all have a slightly different takes and unique advantages and problems.

  • Embedded wireless charging systems have the advantage of being contactless and frictionless. However, they can generally operate only at low power levels of around 3-11 kW, meaning that the vehicle must be on the road a long time to recoup any sort of charge. In fact, even at highway speeds where vehicles use low amounts of power, a small car will still use more energy than it can take on through the wireless e-road. While this can extend the range of the vehicle, the amount of power brought to the vehicle — sold at perhaps only 20¢ per kWh — makes any investment very marginal. In addition to their inefficiency, wireless charging systems are also very intolerant of mis-alignment — a few centimetres to either side can dramatically drop efficiency. In motion at highway speeds, such a fine tolerance of alignment, even by a highly skilled driver, is practically impossible; even the best driver-assist systems available today could not create the vehicle alignment necessary for consistent charging.
  • Embedded conductive charging, usually using a metal strip in the road, also is very problematic. While likely more efficient and somewhat tolerant of mis-alignment, high-power electricity transmission through an embedded metal road strip creates an electrocution danger for humans and animals, especially when raining. As well, the metal track can easily become clogged with road grime, dirt, leaves and, in winter, snow and ice, causing contacts to jump the metal charging track. The sliding metal contacts also create friction, reducing the efficiency of the vehicle, particularly at highway speed. And let’s not even talk about embedding solar panels in road surfaces: that idea was favoured only by people with no understanding of either solar panels or roads and has failed spectacularly where it has been tried as a result.
  • Catenary conductive charging, where an overhead wire is supported by a series of posts, similar to streetcars or trains, largely negates the problems of embedded conductive charging associated with a road surface location. It uses contacts on an overhead pantograph mounted on the vehicle, which is raised when it approaches the e-road. At highway speed, friction and extra aerodynamic drag lower the efficiency of this approach.

Despite the dream, all e-roads systems suffer from some common problems. The first is that the scope is limited to the infrastructure installation. Unlike, larger battery EV applications, which can be driven anywhere, the vehicle’s usefulness is restricted to that section of road where the e-road is installed. This makes a vehicle’s use case, when designed for this application quite narrow, especially if a smaller battery is fitted. 

The infrastructure and maintenance cost for any e-road application is very high, and OEMs, governments and private investors are very reluctant to support such technology when the return per kWh is so small versus the giant infrastructure costs involved.

To make matters worse, Scania and Volvo are the only main OEMs supporting an e-road system. This means interoperability among various heavy-duty OEMs is low. In direct competition to the e-road system, most heavy-duty OEMs are now supporting the CharIn/CCS High-Power Charging for Commercial Vehicles (HPCCV) standard, which allows ultra-high-power conductive charging for battery applications. This standard is far more usable and practical, while the general agreement among almost all OEMs ensures interoperability for almost all users.

Ultimately, e-roads will die due to lack of OEM support and the very high cost of infrastructure. If few OEMs support such a standard, no government or private investor will back such a venture, which ultimately means irrelevance.

Our Halloween conclusion

E-road ideas work far better on rail than road.

In this series

Zombie Technology 1: Solar panels on cars
Zombie Technology 2: Hydrogen fuel cell cars
Zombie Technology 3Wireless charging
Zombie Technology 4: E-roads

James Carter Vision Mobility

James Carter is Principal Consultant of Vision Mobility, a Toronto-based consultancy that provides services to OEMs, Tier 1s, dealers, startups, industry organizations and companies on strategies to succeed in a New Mobility environment. Prior to that, James worked for Toyota for 19 years in Australia, Asia and North America.

1 comment
  1. Many thanks for the whole series of Halloween posts. I greatly enjoyed them and would like to contribute with a few responses to some of the statements regarding e-Roads.

    Quote: “Unlike, larger battery EV applications, which can be driven anywhere, the vehicle’s usefulness is restricted to that section of road where the e-road is installed”
    Possible riposte: Limited by, but not limited to. The vehicles have alternative sources of energy and can drive when not on the catenary, hence their operational flexibility remains undiminished. In fact, the ability to combine catenary trucks with other kinds of drive trains and fuels, makes them more robust when facing technology developments. The superior energy efficiency of catenary is furthermore likely to appreciate in importance, as other transport technology trends (e.g. highly automated highway trucking, high-capacity vehicles) come into the market in the coming years.

    Quote: “The infrastructure and maintenance cost for any e-road application is very high, and OEMs, governments and private investors are very reluctant to support such technology when the return per kWh is so small versus the giant infrastructure costs involved.”
    Possible riposte: Looking at the total system costs makes it clear that infrastructure costs are only a small part of the picture. The savings made possible by shifting trucks from diesel to electricity outweigh the cost of the new infrastructure and vehicle systems. Even in Germany, where electricity prices are high and diesel (relatively low) a truck would save 16.000 EUR for every 100.000 km travelled electrically. In other places, e.g. Sweden, the savings would be much higher. That is a very strong incentive to use the system, as expressed by the actual trucking companies that have used them in the highway trials so far.
    If there was a source for the statement “return per kWh is so small versus the giant infrastructure costs” I would be very interested in reading it.

    Quote: “To make matters worse, Scania and Volvo are the only main OEMs supporting an e-road system. This means interoperability among various heavy-duty OEMs is low. In direct competition to the e-road system, most heavy-duty OEMs are now supporting the CharIn/CCS High-Power Charging for Commercial Vehicles (HPCCV) standard, which allows ultra-high-power conductive charging for battery applications. This standard is far more usable and practical, while the general agreement among almost all OEMs ensures interoperability for almost all users.”
    Possible riposte: @Paul Martin: You seem to be convinced that battery powered long-haul trucks are a bad idea, so how concerned should one be that a HPCCV standard will change that? Even Daimler recently said that battery and fuel cell vehicles will require favourable government policies to 2040, due to the lack of business case for those technologies. Even BNEF, which has been among the most bullish observers on battery EVs, assume that heavy duty trucks will have an almost insignificant market share in the coming decades

    Quote: “Ultimately, e-roads will die due to lack of OEM support and the very high cost of infrastructure. If few OEMs support such a standard, no government or private investor will back such a venture, which ultimately means irrelevance.”
    Possible riposte: If governments want to address anthropogenic global warming, then they need to encourage the deployment of solutions that can achieve GHG reductions on a global scale quickly. Studies have already found that catenary solutions are economic in several markets by 2030, hence it is an option that can be applied and scaled within the time frame set by the Paris Agreement. There is of course the option to wait and hope for some technical break-thorough, but those might be long in coming.
    Catenary is a well-known technology, competitively supplied and already field tested on highways by local trucking companies, carrying out operations using trucks from OEMs. This makes it an attractive option to scale up to shuttle applications, say 20-100 km with 100s of trucks. Such shuttles are already listed by the German and Swedish governments as their policy objectives for the coming years. Once more OEMs see that there is an interest from governments, and the positive experiences from the trucking companies gets more know, the market can take off.

    Quote: “E-road ideas work far better on rail than road.”
    Possible riposte: E-roads work well for rail…on the routes with heavy traffic. On less densely used lines other solutions are needed to be competitive with diesel, e.g. battery trains.
    The same logic also guides the work on electrifying highway trucking. On routes where thousands of trucks drive every day, catenary infrastructure provides a solution that is very energy efficient, allows for lower cost vehicles, while maintaining operational flexibility.

    Many thanks for reading my comments. It would be a pleasure to know what you make of them.

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