Megawatt charger for e-trucks
A fast-charging station that can charge e-trucks within 45 minutes is being developed to enable such vehicles to travel long distances. This will increase the proportion of low-emission means of transport.
Factsheet
- Schools involved School of Engineering and Computer Science
- Institute(s) Institute for Energy and Mobility Research IEM
- Research unit(s) IEM / Batteries and storage systems
- Funding organisation Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft (Bundesverwaltung)
- Duration (planned) 01.01.2022 - 31.12.2023
- Head of project Christian Ochsenbein
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Partner
Bundesamt für Energie BFE
Designwerk GmbH
Ostschweizer Fachhochschule
Wyssmann GmbH (Wyssmann LLC) - Keywords Megawatt charging, electric mobility, e-trucks, battery research
Situation
Heavy goods transport is a key component of the transition to green energies and vital to achieving climate targets. Around 6.6 million trucks are in use on Europe’s roads, carrying 76.7 percent of all freight on land. This makes it important to increase the share of low-emission or emission-free means of transport in this sector too. In order to make electric trucks viable for long-distance haulage, the company Designwerk Technologies AG is working with researchers from the Bern University of Applied Sciences and other research and industry partners to develop a new type of megawatt-class charging station. This will make it possible to fast-charge e-trucks within 45 minutes. In order to keep the load peaks on the grid connection as low as possible, the charging station will also have a battery buffer consisting of second-life batteries.
Course of action
In the scope of this project, the BFH Energy Storage Research Centre is investigating the extent to which second-life batteries are suitable for further use and what service lifetime can be expected as a buffer battery. The development of a second-life model has not yet been studied scientifically in sufficient depth, as most previous work has focused on ageing in the first application life. As a result, the operating behaviour of the batteries with a State of Health (SoH) of between 80 and 60 percent has not yet been researched in any detail. In addition, these lifetime models will be coupled with the economic operating parameters of the various operating modes, to produce a statement about the economic value to the operator. In order to also investigate the impact of fast charging on the vehicle’s batteries, the ageing behaviour of a vehicle battery that is charged predominantly using fast charging will be compared with the ageing of a vehicle battery charged with a ‘normal’ charging strategy. The project is funded by the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (SFOE).
