- Three truck makers including Volvo Trucks, Volkswagen's Traton Group, and Daimler Truck form joint venture to build EV truck charging infrastructure in Europe.
- Electric truck manufacturers are starting to introduce models capable of long-distance routes of hundreds of miles on a single charge.
- The joint venture plans hundreds of EV charging points along major highways in Europe, as well as near industrial hubs.
Volvo Trucks, Volkswagen's Traton Group, and Mercedes-Benz's Daimler Truck unit have formed a joint venture aimed at truck charging, just as the three companies have introduced heavy electric trucks. The final step in forming the venture was completed just days ago, with Anja van Niersen appointed as CEO.
The newly created joint venture plans to build and operate at least 1700 charge points close to major highways and logistics hubs in Europe, creating the necessary infrastructure for a transition to the use of heavy-duty semi trucks along major routes in Europe. The €500 million effort is believed to be the single largest investment in charging infrastructure for heavy-duty trucks in Europe, and it's happening just as the truck makers behind the venture start to roll out long-distance electric semi trucks.
"This is a long-awaited and major step towards achieving the required charging infrastructure for the roll-out and success of battery-electric long-haul trucks and coaches," said Martin Lundstedt, president and CEO Volvo Group. "We are making what would be impossible for one actor alone to accomplish—this strong partnership is a significant milestone and accelerator towards carbon neutral transport in Europe by 2050."
Out of the three automakers behind the new venture, Volvo likely has the lead when it comes to variety of medium-duty electric trucks, and just a couple of months ago has opened the order books for Volvo FH, Volvo FM, and Volvo FMX heavy-duty electric trucks. The three new models will offer battery capacities of up to 540 kWh.
Volkswagen's Traton Group, composed of Scania, MAN, and others, is a bit further back, with plans to offer a heavy-duty semi dubbed the MAN eTruck starting in 2024 with a range of up to 497 miles (800 kilometers) on a full charge.
Mercedes already has medium-duty trucks in production, and plans to launch the eActros LongHaul with a range of around 310 miles in 2024 as well.
"When we talk to customers about electric trucks, they always ask: Where can we charge? To support as fast as possible, we are teaming up and from today on kick-starting the European charging network," said Christian Levin, CEO of the Traton Group "With Anja van Niersen this JV has a CEO with a great deal of experience in setting up charging networks."
When it comes to adoption of long-distance electric trucks, charging infrastructure is easily the main hurdle to customer adoption, as the trucks won't be able to rely on charging overnight at their home bases—not an issue for medium-duty trucks aimed at shorter routes. And the truck makers themselves have known early on that it will be up to them to build out this network and establish common charging hardware and software standards.
