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• Electric long-haul trucks on the horizon 🌅

• 3 Links 🔗

• Meme of the week 🤡

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Electric long-haul trucks on the horizon 🌅

No smell 👃 + No noise 🎧 = Electric trucks ⚡️🚚

With giants like Tesla's Semi and Daimler’s eActros making waves, the transition from diesel to electric in the long-haul trucking industry is looking more promising than ever. While electric passenger vehicles have proven their feasibility, electric trucks are at the tipping point to prove that they can replace diesel trucks.

As the newcomer on the block, we took the Tesla Semi and compared it with the new and the old “world” of a long-established manufacturer, the (e) Actros of Mercedes-Benz, as well as the eGTX by MAN. While the first Tesla Semis are out in the wild and tested extensively by companies like Pepsi, the eActros was presented two weeks ago and its first deliveries were announced for 2024. The MAN eTGX is scheduled to have its first 200 deliveries in 2024, with large scale production starting in 2025.

CapEx - Capital Expenditures 🤑: Undeniably, investment costs for electric long-haul trucks will be higher than comparable ICE trucks. The Tesla Semi will be available with two different battery packs and costs between $150k and $180k in its base version. Mercedes eActros’s price is not available yet but the company expects the electric truck’s price to be at factor 2-2,5 of to its combustion sibling which starts at ~ $105k.

OpEx – Operational Expenditures ⚡️ & 🛢️: Compared to combustion trucks, electric trucks can achieve reduced operations costs in three areas:

1. Efficiency: Pepsi reported that through regenerative braking, their Tesla Semi consumes about 1,7 kWh / mile or 1,1 kWh / km in real-world tests. Assuming the average electricity rate of 0,31 €/ kWh x 1,1 kWh / km = 0,33 € / km vs. 3,5 € / km (2,5 × 1,4 € / L) for the ICE truck. This means charging is about 10 times cheaper than fueling a truck for the same distance driven.

2. Less CO2 emission → fewer tolls & taxes: CO2-based truck toll systems as announced to be launched in Germany as of 1st of July for vehicles over 3.5 tonnes, reward vehicles with fewer CO2 emissions with lower toll fees.

3. Maintenance: Electric trucks generally require less maintenance than their internal combustion counterparts because they have fewer moving parts. For example: There is no oil change required, and regenerative braking systems reduce brake wear.

At the presentation of the eActros 600, we learned some interesting facts:

Battery Warranty 🔋: For the eActros 600, Daimler Truck pointed out that the truck is engineered to last up to 1.2 million kilometers (746k miles) in ten years of operation. After this period, the battery's state of health should still be over 80 percent. Notably, Mercedes-Benz grants a battery warranty of 72 months, or 447,387 miles (720,000 km), or 1,800 charging cycles, whichever comes first. This is an amazing example of how far battery development has come and it’s not going to stop here.🧑‍🔬

Charging 🔌:

• Megawatt Charging ⚡️⚡️: The eActros will be able to charge with up to 1,000 kW using the MCS connector, which enables charging from 20 to 80% in 30 minutes (→ average charging power of 720 kW‼)

• Fast Charging ⚡️: The eActros will get a second charging inlet for the CCS connector (same as passenger vehicles) with up to 400 kW charging speed. Charging from 20% to 80% will be done in approx. one hour.

• ❌ No AC Charging: Slow charging via alternating current was not built-in as charging times eith a 22-kW conboard charger would take more than 1.5 days…

We can already see that the technical requirements for charging are strongly coupled with the mobility needs of truck drivers. To give context, we illustrated a (theoretical) driving and charging procedure for the eActros on up to 474 miles / 764 km distance (almost Munich → Hamburg) with one charging stop along the way:

1. 100% Soc🔋: Charge truck up to 100% at the depot (most likely coupled with loading of the truck)

2. Drive down to 15-25% SoC 🪫: 4.5 hours of driving with 52 miles/hour or 85 km/h → 237 miles / 382 km

3. Recharge on the go up to 80% SoC🔋: 45 min minimum mandatory rest break for the driver = charging time; 20-80% will need one hour for the eActros via CCS which will result in approx. 186 miles / 300 kilometers of added range. Megawatt charging will help to bring this time down closer to 30 minutes.

4. 5-15% SoC at arrival at depot 🪫: After another 4.5 hours driving and a total mileage of 474 miles / 764 km, the truck is unloaded at the depot where it is recharged to 100%.

As you can see, Megawatt charging will be key to decreasing charging times by unlocking up to 1,000 kW charging speed. This will allow long-haul trucks to be operated continuously without excessive breaks for recharging. However, the standardization process of megawatt charging is still ongoing. Therefore, in the beginning, e-trucks will need to rely on passenger electric vehicles’ CCS charging infrastructure. This will come with some challenges e.g. available parking space and missing pull-through options, the peak demand of power at charging locations, and routing data for trucks to find suitable chargers.

3 Thoughts 💭

• Electrification of trucks on the fast lane 🏎️: In a recent interview, Philipp Senoner (CEO and founder of Alpitronic) pointed out that the electrification of trucks will be faster than for passenger vehicles. He points out that long-haul trucks have an average lifetime of 5 years. Additionally, we expect customer demand for sustainable transportation services and governmental regulation to dramatically accelerate the transition. And keep in mind, those trucks drive around a lot more than your personal passenger vehicle. 😉 

• Charging - again a chicken-egg problem 🔌🐣: One of the biggest, or maybe the biggest challenges for electric trucks will be charging infrastructure and electricity costs. Any fleet operator will only purchase trucks if there is a solution for charging those trucks, most likely both, at the depot and on the go. We think truck charging infrastructure can be analyzed across three dimensions:

  • Coverage 📍: Luckily, fleet operators are much more data-driven than us consumers when driving an electric vehicle. Therefore, fleets will make rational choices on electrification based on the availability of charging infrastructure in public and at depots. For on-the-go charging, rest and driving times must be the basis for allocating charging stations (rest time = charging time).

  • Cost 💰: This will become critical because ultimately the total cost of ownership (TCO) will have the biggest influence on the electrification decisions of fleet operators. We expect a majority of the operating expenses (OPEX) to be electricity. Likely, routes with higher public charging share will be less attractive (assuming we see a similar difference in prices for home & public charging costs from passenger cars).

  • Quality 🌟: With the truck driver’s needs in mind, there will be dedicated truck charging hubs for public charging. Milence (JV of Daimler Trucks, TRATON (owner of MAN), and Volvo - aka the IONITY of truck charging) published a potential rendering for one of their charging hubs.

    

    Charging Hub Rendering by Milence

  Will charging infrastructure become the bottleneck in truck electrification? Already today, grid connections constrain construction times, and the required scale of those charging hubs, both public and depot charging, are of much higher multitude. For example, Pepsi installed 7 x V4 Superchargers to run their 21 Tesla Semi fleet, which required a 3 Megawatt grid connection (Video 3:30).

• … and what about trains 🚂: We genuinely appreciate a transition from combustion to electric trucks to reduce CO2 emissions, but ultimately we believe that as a society we are better off by shifting much more transportation towards railways. Especially for long-haul transportation railroad transportation is the most efficient solution. Nevertheless, e-trucks will be needed because of higher flexibility for “last-time” deliveries.

3 Links 🔗

• BP x Tesla ⚡️: BREAKING NEWS across the EV industry this week, as Tesla is officially becoming a supplier of charging stations to other network operators for the first time ever. Specifically, BP’s Pulse network will purchase $100m worth of V4 Superchargers from Tesla for its US network. Charger deployment on BP’s network will start “as early as 2024”. Note three key points in the press release:

  • 3rd party cloud: Superchargers will be paired with BP‘s own charger Management cloud called „Omega“ - presumably via OCPP 2.0.1 communications to be NEVI funding compliant

  • Dual-connector and PnC: BP also talks about Superchargers becoming Plug&Charge enabled and having Tesla‘s magic dock adapters for both CCS and NACS connector compatibility - both further NEVI requirements.

  • HMI visibility: „As is Tesla’s current policy, third-party operated ultra-fast chargers meeting Tesla’s reliability and functionality requirements are featured in Tesla’s vehicle UI and apps, and bp pulse expects to uphold those requirements on its network.“ —> Read: This will be the first time that Tesla shows DC fast chargers that are not Tesla owned & operated in its navigation system in North America. BUT: BP will need to meet Tesla’s uptime requirements with their own service and maintenance operations to maintain this privilege.

  • For further insights & open questions related to the announcement, check out this interview with friend-of-the-newsletter Branden Flasch.

• v4 Supercharger manual leak 👀: Along the lines of the BP announcement, we have also recently seen the full installation manual for Teslas v4 Superchargers get leaked on Twitter. The original post has been taken down, but don’t worry - we’ve got the receipts for y’all right here.

• Wallbox buys ABL 🔌: ABL was a German manufacturer of AC charging stations that recently went bankrupt. Now Spanish charger manufacturer Wallbox has acquired the operations and assets of ABL for ~15M€.

Most-clicked link last week was the Github page of Open Sourcer Charger Management System CitrineOS (Link)

Meme of the Week 🤡

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Reader Review of the Week

Selected ⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️⚡️ Freakin´ awesome on ⚡Why Open Source Charger Management Software is here to stay! and wrote:

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DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial or tax advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. The Electric Avenue team may hold investments in or may otherwise be affiliated with the companies discussed.