How many fast-charging locations are needed in Europe?

A brand new joint research by Fraunhofer ISI and Amazon supplies vital insights as to the optimum quantity and site of public fast-charging stations required to allow the widespread electrification of long-haul trucking in Europe.

Utilizing site visitors movement estimates for 2030, the research constructed on Amazon’s open-source CHALET device to investigate 20,000 potential public truck charging places alongside the main European highways and a big knowledge set of 1.6 million truck journey combos.

The outcomes counsel that simply 1,000 charging stations outfitted with Megawatt Charging System (MCS) retailers might allow about 91% of anticipated long-haul trucking site visitors.

To scale back greenhouse gas emissions from transport basically and from heavy-duty vehicles specifically, it’s obligatory for all EU Member States to deploy infrastructure for different fuels within the coming years. This contains the deployment of public fast-charging infrastructure for vehicles alongside motorways.

An EU regulation has already set concrete minimal targets concerning public truck charging infrastructure for all EU Member States: as an example, Germany will need to have a complete of roughly 300 places by 2030 and greater than 2,000 truck charging places are required throughout the entire of Europe by 2030.

Nevertheless, the restricted vary of battery-electric vehicles in comparison with at the moment’s diesel autos, raises the query of what number of fast-charging places are wanted in Europe.

Thus far, little is thought about optimum truck charging places for long-haul trucking in Europe. To shed some mild on this, the research suggests optimized truck charging networks consisting of publicly accessible places throughout the continent.

Based mostly on European truck site visitors movement estimates for 2030, and precise truck cease places, a long-term minimal charging community was created that covers the anticipated charging demand. The research additionally thought-about native capability constraints and calculated an optimized step-by-step community enlargement alongside the routes with the very best demand in Europe.

About 1,000 charging places might cowl virtually all truck site visitors in Europe

The important thing findings present that for an electrification goal of 15% battery electrical truck (BET) share in long-haul, 1,000 optimally chosen charging places might allow 91% of truck site visitors whereas 500 places would enable for about half of truck flows.

This result’s significantly shocking, because the variety of steered places is smaller than the minimal infrastructure targets required by the European Union. As well as, the authors assumed no depot charging and solely 400 km of real-world vary which some newly out there industrial battery truck fashions already exceed.

When it comes to the optimum places for truck charging hubs in Europe, the research recommends high-traffic routes, with places concentrated at main intersections and corridors. Because the community expands, extra places can be added to cowl much less trafficked routes.

The necessity for fewer however greater energy stations for quick battery truck transition

Dr. Patrick Plötz, Coordinator of the Enterprise Unit Power Financial system at Fraunhofer ISI and writer of the research stated, “These outcomes present that even fewer places than required by the European Union would allow virtually all European truck site visitors. Nevertheless, the places which can be constructed might want to safe ample grid energy, with some websites requiring as much as 12 megawatts of grid capability to help as much as 20 MCS retailers.

“This highlights the significant energy requirements and grid infrastructure needed to support the electrification of Europe’s commercial trucking sector at scale; several European Governments are already actively working on this challenge.”

Patrick Plötz concludes {that a} strategically deliberate community based mostly on megawatt charging might considerably help the adoption of battery electrical vehicles in Europe: “This analysis means that business must speed up improvement and adoption of megawatt charging programs like MCS, as this permits logistics operators who do not need entry to depots to successfully electrify their fleets.

“Commercialization of MCS can avoid the cost and complexities of securing external real estate and power, which are critical barriers to the total cost of ownership for battery electric trucks.”

The evaluation used Amazon’s open-source CHALET device which was developed to assist business, governments, and local authorities determine optimum places for electrical truck charging infrastructure. It takes under consideration components corresponding to site visitors flows, automobile vary, and transit instances to determine precedence places for eHGV charging factors to speed up the transfer to sustainable transportation. The open-source code is obtainable on GitHub.