The Financial Express (Delhi Edition)
Shock & awe
How about a road that’s fully ‘electrified’? Head to Gavle in Sweden...
IF YOU’RE near the city of Gavle in central Sweden, you’ll get to see, or maybe even drive on, the world’s first “electric road”—the result of a unique partnership between the Swedish government and automotive major Scania to demonstrate the path towards fossil-free transportation. Scania is also supplying electrically powered trucks, which will operate under real traffic conditions.
Opened recently, the 2-km strip on the E16 motorway will see “electrified trucks” from Scania being driven in open traffic, using conductive technology developed by Ger man engineering major Siemens.
The beauty of the new technology, which is the result of several years of cooperation between the Swedish government and the private sector, is that it per mits the trucks to operate as electric vehicles when on the electrified road and as regular hybrid vehicles at other times. All the Scania trucks on the road are hybrid and Euro 6-certified, running on biofuel.
The truck receives electrical power from a pantograph (a jointed framework conveying a current to a train, tram or other electric vehicle from overhead wires) power collector that is mounted on the frame. The pantographs are, in turn, connected to overhead power lines that are above the right-hand lane of the road. The trucks can freely connect to and disconnect from the overhead wires while in motion.
When the truck goes outside the electrically-powered lane, the pantograph is disconnected and the truck is then powered by the combustion engine or the battery-operated electric motor. The same principle applies when the driver wants to overtake another vehicle while on the electrified strip of the road.
Scania sees the electric road as a key component in achieving Sweden’s ambition of an energy-efficient and fossilfree vehicle fleet by 2030. It can also help to strengthen Sweden’s competitiveness in the rapidly-developing area of sustainable transport.
The pilot tests are expected to continue through 2018, as per a press release by the Swedish transport administration. Decisions about a possible rollout of the technology will follow the pilot completion, the release said.
The idea isn’t exactly a new one, though. In fact, Seattle in the US has been running electric ‘trolleybuses’ since 1940. The trolleybus system consists of 15 routes, with 159 trolleybuses operating on 68 miles (109 km) of twoway overhead wires. As of spring 2015, the system carried riders on an average of 74,000 trips per weekday, comprising about 18% of the total daily ridership of King County Metro, the operator of the trolleybus system.
Of the five trolleybus systems currently operating in the US, the Seattle system is the second largest (by ridership and fleet size), after the San Francisco system.
Opened recently, the 2-km strip will see ‘electrified trucks’ being driven on it, using conductive technology developed by German engineering major Siemens