4th April 2022
E-highways: the solution for reducing HGV emissions?
Need for a solution to haulage emissions
The current limits of battery technology mean that electrifying HGVs with existing rechargeable batteries is not viable due to their size and the long-haul nature of their use.
Tesla’s Semi demonstrates this. The weight of the batteries required would significantly increase the cost and raises questions about efficiency, as the vehicle would need to be off the road to charge for a significant amount of time.
What is an e-highway?
An e-highway uses dynamic charging to allow electric trucks to charge while driving, meaning that they would switch from e-highways to regular highways seamlessly and would not require charging stops. The cost of purchasing and replacing batteries would also be reduced, saving both fleet operators and the environment.
This would be executed by installing overhead powerlines, similar to those used by trains. The lines would be out of reach of other road users – not affecting their journeys. With this solution, upgrading roads would be comparatively quick and affordable, minimising road closures and delays.
According to the report by the
Centre for Sustainable Road Freight, implementing this type of electric road system is estimated to cost £19.3bn and could make 65% of the UK accessible to long-haul electric vehicles by the late 2030s. The cost of implementation and the energy savings could see the investment pay for itself within 15 years.
How does it work?
What are the negatives?
While the technological and environmental arguments are strong, there are still questions over the practical implementation. A good example of this is how vehicle excise duty (VED) will be collected when entire fleets are running on electric rather than fossil fuels. Haulage companies would likely be charged for the construction of infrastructure to support this enormous project through taxation, as well as paying for the energy itself.
In an industry where there is currently little room to manoeuvre due to increasing fuel costs and the driver shortage, the lack of certainty about tax rates means that fleets are more likely to wait and see rather than jump in as early adopters.
With so many alternative solutions for reducing emissions still being trialled, there is a lot of uncertainty about not only which is the most effective, but the most realistic carbon reduction strategy in terms of ease and speed of implementation. Until a uniform approach is agreed on by governments or the industry itself, many fleets will simply stick with the status quo.
Even with the approach agreed upon, the e-highways system would require both compatible vehicles and new road infrastructure. The complexity of making compatible trucks affordable and preparing the roads simultaneously means that there is likely to be a period where e-highways are completed but severely underutilised.
European trials
While trials are new in the UK, e-highway systems have been in development for over a decade in Europe. In Germany, the first demonstration began on a private road in 2010 – a 2.1 km highway test track. The first public e-highway opened in Sweden in 2016 on a
stretch of the E16 motorway between Gävle and Sandviken.
Alternatives
While hydrogen and biofuels are touted as common green alternatives to electricity, they are thought to be inefficient due to the creation and conversion processes using
almost three times as much energy as the e-highways. They also raise some of the same issues – a lack of existing infrastructure in place and not enough compatible vehicles.
With questions over the alternatives, electric overhead rails could be a viable mid-term solution that ensures that the UK government’s pledge for zero-emission HGVs by 2040 is met. However, this is unlikely to be the only source of power. With just 65% of the UK expected to be covered by e-highways in the initial rollout, a new form of a hybrid vehicle could likely emerge – trucks with the ability to run on hydrogen or
biomethane, but also connect to e-highways where available.