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Charging Electric Trucks: Exploring Options at Ports

To fulfill our vision of electrifying America’s trucks, a necessary action is developing the infrastructure able to charge electric trucks. Port terminals are a good place to effectively charge electric trucks, as many transportation trucks spend time idling and picking up containers. There are two infrastructure options to charge electric trucks: catenaries or electric charging stations.  We evaluate the economic, environmental, and infrastructural perspectives of the two options below. A main result of our research is that electric charging stations are easier to implement infrastructurally, but both solutions are economically feasible in the long term and reduce CO2 emissions by half.

Catenaries are overhead wires that attach to the top of a truck and charge the electric motor, during which the truck must be in motion. Electric charging stations charge trucks that are plugged into it, during which the truck must be stationary. 

Catenaries and electric charging stations have both been launched in the ports of Los Angeles and Oakland, respectively, to test out their feasibility.[1]Sarah Holder, “How Old Trolley Technology Is Powering the Trucks of Tomorrow,” Trucks.com, October 11, 2017, www.trucks.com/2017/10/11/old-trolley-technology-powering-trucks/.[2]CBS San Francisco, “Port of Oakland Adds Electric Trucks, Charging Stations in Pilot Project,” CBS San Francisco (CBS San Francisco, July 19, 2021), … Continue reading However, they are far from becoming the norm. 

Trucks attaching to an overhead catenary[3]Sarah Holder, “How Old Trolley Technology Is Powering the Trucks of Tomorrow,” Trucks.com, October 11, 2017, www.trucks.com/2017/10/11/old-trolley-technology-powering-trucks/.

Electric Charging Stations

Electric charging stations can charge trucks without greatly altering their scheduled pickups in ports. Full charging duration depends on the power of the charging station and can range anywhere from 30 minutes to over 12 hours.[4]“How Long Does It Take to Charge an Electric Car?,” Pod Point, accessed November 15, 2021, www.pod-point.com/guides/driver/how-long-to-charge-an-electric-car. Furthermore, truckers often spend 30 minutes to 6 hours waiting in a stationary truck before picking up an assigned container to bring to their final destination.[5]Port Trucking: Is It for You? What It’s Like, YouTube (YouTube, 2018), www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1KaSrxTlPg. With enough powerful charging stations, trucks can be reliably charged in ports during their idle time, even if it is only 30 minutes. 

While upfront costs are high, electric trucks are less costly over time compared to diesel trucks. There already exist parking spaces for stationary trucks in ports, so there is no need to build new parking spaces. Initial cost mostly comes from the construction of the charging stations, which costs on average $170,000 dollars per station.[6]CBS San Francisco, “Port of Oakland Adds Electric Trucks, Charging Stations in Pilot Project,” CBS San Francisco (CBS San Francisco, July 19, 2021), … Continue reading In the long term, expenses mainly accrue from electricity charges. While expenses are difficult to calculate directly, electric vehicles have consistently lower fuel cost per mile travelled, sometimes less than half the cost of gasoline vehicles.[7]“Comparing Energy Costs per Mile for Electric and Gasoline,” Idaho National Laboratory, accessed November 15, 2021, www.avt.inl.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/fsev/costs.pdf. In the long term, charging stations are worth the investment.

There are emissions benefits as well; in particular, CO2 emissions decrease. All-electric vehicles more than halve CO2 emissions compared to gasoline vehicles.[8]“Emissions from Hybrid and Plug-in Electric Vehicles,” Alternative Fuels Data Center: Emissions from Hybrid and Plug-In Electric Vehicles (US Department of Energy), accessed November 15, 2021, … Continue reading Electric trucks do not offer zero carbon, but it is an improvement from diesel.

Catenaries

Economically, caternaries cost a lot initially but are also viable in the long run. The cost of catenary is estimated at $1.8 million per mile. In the long run, the lifecycle costs of trucks on catenaries consists mostly of “energy costs, vehicle costs, and variable costs”. It evaluates to about one to two dollars per mile travelled.[9]Ivan Mareev and Dirk Uwe Sauer, “Energy Consumption and Life Cycle Costs of Overhead Catenary Heavy-Duty Trucks for Long-Haul Transportation,” MDPI (Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing … Continue reading According to an economic analysis, the lifecycle costs of catenaries are a bit less than both electric vehicles and diesel:

Figure 1: Life cycle costs of overhead catenary trucks, battery electric trucks, and diesel trucks.[10]Ivan Mareev and Dirk Uwe Sauer, “Energy Consumption and Life Cycle Costs of Overhead Catenary Heavy-Duty Trucks for Long-Haul Transportation,” MDPI (Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing … Continue reading

The energy consumption of a catenary truck is similar compared to an electric truck, and both are half the energy consumption of a diesel truck.[11]Ivan Mareev and Dirk Uwe Sauer, “Energy Consumption and Life Cycle Costs of Overhead Catenary Heavy-Duty Trucks for Long-Haul Transportation,” MDPI (Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing … Continue reading

However, constructing catenaries in ports is significantly more difficult than electric charging stations. Truck routes through ports vary widely; truckers pick up containers from different loading areas in the terminal. There is little common road where trucks can pass through, and thus catenaries in terminals can only reach a certain percentage of trucks and are not as efficient as charging ports. 

Electric Charging at Ports Timeline

Figure 1 shows the number of electric trucks that will be converted as a function of time. The number of electric charging stations should match the number of electric trucks. The number of trucks at each port varies; therefore, the number of charging stations will vary at each port but follow the general shape of the function above.

Figure 2: Function for Conversion to Electric Trucks. Graph produced from our analysis. See Timeline and Carbon Calculations for more description of our analysis.

All the calculations below are based on the data of the San Pedro Bay Ports (the Port of Long Beach and Port of Los Angeles). [12]Fueling the Future Fleet: Assessment of Public Truck Charging and Fueling Near the Port of Long Beach. Starcrest Consulting Group, LLC, 2021. … Continue reading

  • Only about 42% of trucks will be able to charge at private trucking facilities, which leaves out 58% of trucks that require public electric charging. Since battery-electric class 8 trucks are in their infancy, it is not known how many charging stations will be needed. The team takes the conservative estimate that one overnight charging station could charge 2 trucks, and one opportunity charger could support six heavy-duty trucks.
  • It is estimated that the 8,500 trucks that need to be publicly charged at San pedro Bay ports will need 1,400-4,300 public charging stations in the area, with about one-third of these stations falling within the 10-mile radius of the port complex (Table 1). 
    • Following this, the team calculated the number of publicly available charging stations around the area needed to be 16.47-50.08% of the number of trucks around the area that need public charging stations, or 9.52-29.25% of the total number of trucks around the area. 
    • The number of publicly available charging stations within the 10-mile radius around the port complex needed will be 5.49-16.86% of the number of trucks around the area that need public charging stations, or 1.83-5.62% of the total number of trucks around the area.
Table 1: Estimate of Publicly Accessible Charging Units Needed. [13]Fueling the Future Fleet: Assessment of Public Truck Charging and Fueling Near the Port of Long Beach. Starcrest Consulting Group, LLC, 2021. … Continue reading

Timeline

  • 2021 to 2030: Start implementing electric charging stations at ports, decrease diesel stations. Ports will not implement biofuel stations since biofuel trucks are only used for a  short period of time to phase out diesel trucks.
  • 2030-2044: increase the number of charging stations to 100% at ports as biofuels are phased out as only electric vehicles are sold. The number of stations should follow the number of electric trucks that are around the port.
  • By 2044: Provide charging stations in all ports for battery-electric trucks in the US. The number of public electric charging stations needed around the larger port area will be  9.52-29.25% of the total number of trucks around the area. The number of public electric charging stations within the 10-mile radius of the port complex should be 1.83-5.62% of the total number of trucks around the area. This number will be enough to charge all of the trucks that need public charging stations.[14]Fueling the Future Fleet: Assessment of Public Truck Charging and Fueling Near the Port of Long Beach. Starcrest Consulting Group, LLC, 2021. … Continue reading

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