Electric Road System – The Road of the Future
Hi, I’m Priyanka Sunil- A final year MBA student from Amrita School Of Business majoring in Operations and Marketing. Welcome to my progressive learning space for Logistics and Supply Chain Management.
Until some years ago,
there was a belief that electric cars, buses and trucks, both in terms of
efficiency and driving range, were inferior to fuel-powered vehicles. Development
in autonomous technology and related infrastructure has evolved soo much in ways
unimaginable in a span of 20 years. In this autonomous-driving revolution, the road of the future is
likely to become the central nervous system.
The
worldwide Green House Gas emissions must be decreased by 40 percent-70 percent
in order to sustain the global temperature increase below 2 percent and prevent
extreme climate change. As road transport is a big GHG contributor, we will
need to rely on anything other than fossil fuels for our transport needs in
several years. One possible alternative is for our vehicles to run on
electricity supplied along the road. According to the report of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 72% of the 23% of the global
transport sector's total energy-related CO2 emissions are due to road
transport, which is expected to rise by 59% by 2030
Electric Road System-Types
The road freight
transport can be made more sustainable by the implementation of an electric
road system (ERS) which provides
electric power to trucks equipped with an electromotor by the use of an external
power source. Electric road systems (ERS) provide a way of powering
and charging a vehicle as it is driving along a road.
There are three main types of ERS:
·
Overhead lines: Two conductive lines
are suspended over the road at a height of approximately 5meters to power heavy
commercial vehicles.
·
Conductive track: These are simply
conductive metal tracks installed in or on the surface of a road or sometimes
along the side of the road.
·
Inductive track: These are buried
conductive coils below the surface of the road. An electric current is induced
in a coil on the bottom of the car.
Hybrid trucks consisting of an electromotor taking energy from an
external source, as well as an on-board power source (fuel or energy-based), are
used in these methods to ensure that the trucks have a continuous power source
while they are not connected to the external grid. If the hybrid truck is
fitted with a battery, the ERS and the regenerative braking system will then charge
it.
This does not
necessitate electrification of all highways. Rather, on long stretches of
highways and in busy areas of urban road networks, charging zones will be
included. Since 2016, these systems have been in trial service in Sweden
and Germany on public highways.
Sweden
is leading our way…..!!!
Road transport accounts for one-third of Sweden's
carbon emissions, one-fourth of which is due to heavy freight transport. Sweden
has committed to making a transport sector independent of fossil-fuel vehicles
by 2030 as part of its climate protection strategy.
Sweden debuted the world’s first electrified road near Stockholm.
South Korea and China also have been investing in solar-powered electromagnetic
roads that recharge cars and trucks wirelessly to charge of EV batteries and
reduce carbon emissions.
The
world's first electrified road that uses a flexible arm to charge the batteries
of moving vehicles recently debuted in Sweden. Two kilometers of the rail is
embedded in a road near Stockholm. The road recharges vehicles' batteries as
they move down it. It operates by using a movable arm that transfers the power
from the rails to the vehicle battery by linking the vehicles to two
electrified rails. The ERS decreases emissions of carbon dioxide by up to 90
percent. Even though The electrification of a kilometre of road costs around $1
million, it is 50 times less costly than the installation of an urban tram
line. The strategy is to expand throughout Sweden to help minimise transport
using fossil fuels by 70 percent by 2030
There
are a few other eco-sustainable solutions being used across the globe. South
Korea developed a 12-kilometer asphalt roadway with electric cables in 2013, to
build an electromagnetic field for wireless charging of moving passenger buses,
China is testing a "intelligent highway" to produce electricity using
solar panels to minimise transportation sector emissions.
Over
100 years of electric vehicles
It
was over 100 years ago, that the first electric cars were produced in US and they
controlled the roads until around 1915. There are two methods for powering
vehicles with electricity : stored battery power and direct feeds when in
motion. Both of these techniques are more than 100 years old.
The
challenges of using battery power
Even
the best batteries could only store a
fraction of the energy compared with the energy content of diesel, for example.
This makes driving longer distances more difficult.
Is ERS a better
economic solution?
Current
infrastructure can be exploited by the electrification of roads to reduce
energy use and carbon emissions. Electrified-road transport eliminates fossil
emissions by 80 to 90 percent and is a cost-effective, climate-smart way of
combining the benefits of rail with truck versatility. Due to substantial
reductions in energy usage resulting from the use of powerful electric engines,
operating costs would be minimal. Electricity is also a cleaner, quieter and
less expensive source of energy, compared with diesel.
Reference
https://eroadarlanda.com/need-electrified-roads/
https://www.vti.se/en/news/electric-roads-a-solution-for-the-future/
https://www.engineering.com/AdvancedManufacturing/ArticleID/20157/Electric-Road-Systems.aspx
https://www.sia-partners.com/en/news-and-publications/from-our-experts/electrified-road-freight-transport
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