- About a kilometer and a half of French motorway has been equipped with induction coils
- The small section is a test bench for trucks, vans, cars and buses
- Sustained charging speeds of over 200 kW have been reported
France, a small stretch of highway just outside Paris, currently serves as a test bed for the next generation of dynamic vehicle charging, offering charging speeds of up to 300 kW without the need for cumbersome wires and cables.
As part of the Charge as you Drive project, which involves Electreon, Gustave Eiffel University and Vinci – a global mobility infrastructure company – the 1.5 km (just under a mile) stretch of the A10 motorway has been equipped with induction coils below the surface, so that those involved in the project can evaluate the performance of the inductive charging system.
According to Vinci, the first results were “very encouraging”, with more than 300 kW of instantaneous power delivered and 200 kW of average power delivered under optimal “steady state” conditions.
The trials, which are taking place on highways open to the public, currently involve only a truck, a van, a car and a coach, all equipped with the appropriate reception technology to wirelessly recharge the on-board batteries.
Vinci says that if deployed at scale, inductively charged road surfaces could significantly reduce the weight of electric vehicle batteries, as they would not need to be so large to provide the range required to get from point A to point B.
On the contrary, as long as the batteries provide enough range to travel to and from these stretches of highway, they could be drastically reduced – by “several tons in the case of heavy electric vehicles”, according to Vinci.
As a result, costs, carbon footprint and hardware footprint would also be reduced, while eliminating charging stops and range limitations, both of which are costly for fleet operators.
The French project is the only trial in the world currently being carried out on open highways, but it is not the first of its kind, with bus lines in Germany, taxis in Sweden and heavy goods vehicles in the United States all undergoing similar experiments to validate the technology.
Analysis: Too good to be true?
Wireless charging of electric vehicles isn’t exactly a new concept, with some of the first demonstrations of dynamic charging taking place as early as 2010.
However, the technology has evolved to the point where it can now be introduced onto public roads on a small scale.
Additionally, Porsche has demonstrated that static wireless charging can be a commercially viable offering, with an 11 kW wireless charging pad now offered to customers of the upcoming Cayenne EV.
But rolling out a network of new roads equipped with induction coils would prove horribly expensive and upgrading infrastructure with this technology would be even worse, especially considering the disruption it would cause.
Vinci also doesn’t say how expensive the custom wireless receivers were to build and install on an existing electric vehicle, assuming they would have to be special enough to handle the touted high charging speeds.
Rather than tearing up roads and installing expensive induction coils, some parts of the world have managed to decarbonize their public transport systems by using overhead cables, either to power trams or to quickly charge electric buses at each stop.
Vinci’s vision is to accelerate the electrification of heavy goods vehicles in the goods transport and logistics sector, which alone represents more than 16% of France’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to Nicolas Notebaert, general manager of Vinci Concessions.
If dynamic charging can reduce the energy density required in trucks, it could convince fleet operators to make the switch. But convincing governments to foot the infrastructure bill could be the biggest challenge.
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