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Automated charging technologies are becoming increasingly important in the electrification of heavy road freight transport, especially in combination with autonomous driving. This study provides a comprehensive analysis of automated charging technologies for electric heavy-duty vehicles (HDVs). It encompasses the entire spectrum of feasible technologies, including static and dynamic approaches, with each charging technology evaluated for its advantages, potentials, challenges and technology readiness level (TRL). Static conductive charging methods such as charging robots, underbody couplers, or pantographs show good potential, with pantographs being the most mature option. These technologies are progressing towards higher TRLs, with a focus on standardization and adaptability. While static wireless charging is operational for some prototype solutions, it encounters challenges related to implementation and efficiency. Dynamic conductive charging through an overhead contact line or contact rails holds promise for high-traffic HDV routes with the overhead contact line being the most developed option. Dynamic wireless charging, although facing efficiency challenges, offers the potential for seamless integration into roads and minimal wear and tear. Battery swapping is emerging as a practical solution to reduce downtime for charging, with varying levels of readiness across different implementations. To facilitate large-scale deployment, further standardization efforts are required. This study emphasizes the necessity for continued research and development to enhance efficiency, decrease costs and ensure seamless integration into existing infrastructures. Technologies that achieve this best will have the highest potential to significantly contribute to the creation of an efficiently automated and environmentally friendly transport sector.

Recent developments in vehicle-integrated photovoltaics (VIPV) offer prospects for enhancing electric vehicle range, lowering operating costs, and supporting carbon-neutral transport, particularly in urban settings. This study evaluates the solar energy potential of parking spaces in Berlin, considering challenges like building and tree shading using digital surface models and weather data for solar simulations. Utilizing open datasets and software, the analysis covered 48,827 parking spaces, revealing that VIPV could extend vehicle range by 7 to 14 km per day, equating to a median annual increase of 2527 km. The findings suggest median yearly cost savings of 164 euros from reduced grid charging. However, the environmental benefits of solar vehicle charging were found to be less than those of traditional grid-connected photovoltaic systems. The study introduces a method to pinpoint parking spaces that are most suitable for solar charging.

Addressing the pressing challenge of global warming, reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the transportation sector is a critical imperative. Battery and fuel cell electric vehicles have emerged as promising solutions for curbing emissions in this sector. In this study, we conducted a comprehensive life cycle assessment (LCA) for typical passenger vehicles, heavy-duty trucks, and city buses using either proton-exchange membrane fuel cells or Li-ion batteries with different cell chemistries. To ensure accuracy, we supplemented existing studies with data from the literature, particularly for the recycling phase, as database limitations were encountered. Our results highlight that fuel cell and battery systems exhibit large emissions in the production phase. Recycling can significantly offset some of these emissions, but a comparison of the technologies examined revealed considerable differences. Overall, battery electric vehicles consistently outperform fuel cell electric vehicles regarding absolute greenhouse gas emissions. Hence, we recommend prioritizing battery electric over fuel cell vehicles. However, deploying fuel cell electric vehicles could become attractive in a hydrogen economy scenario where other factors, e.g., the conversion and storage of surplus renewable electricity via electrolysis, become important.

Abstract The option of decarbonizing urban freight transport using battery electric vehicle (BEV) seems promising. However, there is currently a strong debate whether fuel cell electric vehicle (FCEV) might be the better solution. The question arises as to how a fleet of FCEV influences the operating cost, the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and primary energy demand in comparison to BEVs and to Internal Combustion Engine Vehicle (ICEV). To investigate this, we simulate the urban food retailing as a representative share of urban freight transport using a multi-agent transport simulation software. Synthetic routes as well as fleet size and composition are determined by solving a vehicle routing problem. We compute the operating costs using a total cost of ownership analysis and the use phase emissions as well as primary energy demand using the well to wheel approach. While a change to BEV results in 17–23% higher costs compared to ICEV, using FCEVs leads to 22–57% higher costs. Assuming today’s electricity mix, we show a GHG emission reduction of 25% compared to the ICEV base case when using BEV. Current hydrogen production leads to a GHG reduction of 33% when using FCEV which however cannot be scaled to larger fleets. Using current electricity in electrolysis will increase GHG emission by 60% compared to the base case. Assuming 100% renewable electricity for charging and hydrogen production, the reduction from FCEVs rises to 73% and from BEV to 92%. The primary energy requirement for BEV is in all cases lower and for higher compared to the base case. We conclude that while FCEV have a slightly higher GHG savings potential with current hydrogen, BEV are the favored technology for urban freight transport from an economic and ecological point of view, considering the increasing shares of renewable energies in the grid mix.

The majority of freight in Germany is carried out by trucks, resulting in emitting approximately 9% of Germany’s carbon dioxide equivalent emissions. In particular, long-distance truck journeys contribute significantly to these emissions. This paper aims to explore the conditions and impacts of introducing E-Trucks in Germany by utilizing a microscopic traffic simulation approach. Therefore, five different electrification levels of the long-distance truck traffic are evaluated. The demand-oriented charging network dimensioning aims for a realistic and implementable design and is based on an average charging power of 720 kW. Additionaly, it considers the necessary infrastructure requirements at service and rest areas next to the motorway. The results of this research provide valuable insights in terms of usage, requirements and demand. For an electrification level of 1%, 177 chargers at 173 charging sites must be implemented, while 1296 chargers and 457 charging sites must be built for an electrification level of 20%. The increase in the electrification level leads to more efficient occupancy of the charging facilities; i.e., an increase from 1% to 5% improves the average occupation time ratio per charger by approximately 130%. Of the total energy consumed, 65% is recharged en-route at public chargers. Between Monday and Thursday, each 1% electrification level increase requires 2.68 GW h more energy for the public recharging network.

A key factor in limiting global warming is the conversion of conventional electricity generation to renewable energy sources. However, a major obstacle is that renewable energy generation and energy demand often do not coincide in time, and energy must therefore be stored temporarily. Vehicle to grid (V2G) can be used to store excess renewable energy in battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and feed it back into the electric grid when needed. For effective V2G operation, the grid may have to be expanded, as the energy needs to be transported to BEVs. However, the grid should only be strengthened where renewable energy demand exceeds current grid capacity due to high grid expansion costs. This requires a method that determines the spatial distribution of V2G potential at a high resolution. Since such a method has not yet been reported in the existing literature, and so is developed in this paper. The method is demonstrated for the city of Berlin and its 448 sub-districts. For each sub-district, the method allows determining the percentage of residential and BEV energy demand that can be met by renewables if V2G is deployed, and answers the question of whether a full renewable supply is possible. The results show that BEVs can be effectively used as intermediate storage for renewable energy. If 30% of the BEVs participate in V2G, more than 99% of the energy demand of households and BEVs in Berlin can be covered by renewables on certain days. On the other hand, V2G deployment increases the average peak load in the districts by up to 100% and results in a nearly double load on vehicle batteries. High shares of renewable energy can be observed in districts with a high degree of motorization, which are predominantly found in the outskirts of the city.

To enable the deployment of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) as passenger cars in the private transport sector, suitable charging infrastructure is crucial. In this paper, a methodology for the efficient spatial distribution of charging infrastructure is evaluated by investigating a scenario with a 100% market penetration of BEVs of (around 1.3 million vehicles) in Berlin, Germany. The goal of the evaluated methodology is the development of various charging infrastructure scenarios—including public and private charging—which are suitable to cover the entire charging demand. Therefore, these scenarios are investigated in detail with a focus on the number of public charging points, their spatial distributions, the available charging power, and the necessary capital costs. For the creation of these charging infrastructure scenarios, a placement model is developed. As input, it uses the data of a multi-agent transport simulation (MATSim) scenario of the metropolitan area of Berlin to evaluate and optimize different distributions of charging infrastructure. The model uses a genetic algorithm and the principle of multi-objective optimization. The capital costs of the charging points and the mean detour car drivers must undertake are used as the optimization criteria. Using these criteria, we expect to generate cost-efficient infrastructure solutions that provide high usability at the same time. The main advantage of the method selected is that multiple optimal solutions with different characteristics can be found, and suitable solutions can be selected by subsequently using other criteria. Besides the generated charging scenarios for Berlin, the main goal of this paper is to provide a valid methodology, which is able to use the output data of an agent-based, microscopic transport simulation of an arbitrary city or area (or even real driving data) and calculate different suitable charging infrastructure scenarios regarding the different optimization criteria. This paper shows a possible application of this method and provides suggestions to improve the significance of the results in future works. The optimized charging infrastructure solutions for the Berlin scenario show capital costs of between EUR 624 and 2950 million. Users must cover an additional mean detour of 254 m to 590 m per charging process to reach an available charging point. According to the results, a suitable ratio between the charging points and vehicles is between 11:1 and 5:1. A share of fast charging infrastructure (>50 kW) of less than ten percent seems to be sufficient if it is situated at the main traffic routes and highly frequented places.

The rise in electric vehicle uptake has reshaped the German mobility landscape at unprecedented speed and scale. While public charging is pivotal to growing the electric vehicle market, municipalities can play a crucial role in accelerating the energy transition in transport. This research aims to assist municipalities in planning their strategic rollouts of public charging infrastructure in size and location. In the first step, charging demand is estimated based on four development scenarios in 2030 of EV adoption and public charging. In a second step, a geospatial analysis was performed on the study area. Supply and demand criteria were considered to reflect the attractiveness of each location on a grid map. While the supply criteria represent constraints related to infrastructure availability, the demand criteria are categorized into three dimensions: residential, commercial, and leisure. The prioritization of demand criteria was derived from the municipality’s input using the analytical hierarchy process method to reflect its strategy. After obtaining the suitability index map, a cluster analysis was performed using a k-means clustering algorithm to ensure adequate geographical coverage of the charging network. Finally, the proposed charging stations in each scenario were allocated to the top-scoring locations, establishing a municipal public charging network.

Electrification is a potential solution for transport decarbonization and already widely available for individual and public transport. However, the availability of electrified commercial vehicles like waste collection vehicles is still limited, despite their significant contribution to urban emissions. Moreover, there is a lack of clarity whether electric waste collection vehicles can persist in real world conditions and which system design is required. Therefore, we introduce a multi-agent-based simulation methodology to investigate the technical feasibility and evaluate environmental and economic sustainability of an electrified urban waste collection. We present a synthetic model for waste collection demand on a per-link basis, using open available data. The tour planning is solved by an open-source algorithm as a capacitated vehicle routing problem (CVRP). This generates plausible tours which handle the demand. The generated tours are simulated with an open-source transport simulation (MATSim) for both the diesel and the electric waste collection vehicles. To compare the life cycle costs, we analyze the data using total cost of ownership (TCO). Environmental impacts are evaluated based on a Well-to-Wheel approach. We present a comparison of the two propulsion types for the exemplary use case of Berlin. And we are able to generate a suitable planning to handle Berlin’s waste collection demand using battery electric vehicles only. The TCO calculation reveals that the electrification raises the total operator cost by 16–30%, depending on the scenario and the battery size with conservative assumptions. Furthermore, the greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) can be reduced by 60–99%, depending on the carbon footprint of electric power generation.

Electric moped scooter sharing services have recently experienced strong growth rates, particularly in Europe. Due to their compactness, environmental-friendliness and convenience, shared e-mopeds are suitable for helping to reduce the environmental impact of urban transport. However, its traffic-related, economic and environmental effects are merely represented in academic research. Therefore, this study investigates the ability of an e-moped sharing system to substitute passenger car trips, and the resulting economic and environmental effects. First, we model fleets of 2500, 10,000 and 50,000 shared e-mopeds in Berlin, based on a passenger car scenario generated by the multi-agent transport simulation framework MATSim. Afterwards, the total cost of ownership and a life cycle assessment are conducted. The results indicate that a substantial part of all passenger car trips in Berlin can be substituted. The larger the fleet, the more and longer trips are replaced. Simultaneously, the efficiency in terms of fleet utilization decreases. The scenario with 10,000 e-mopeds offers the lowest total distance-based costs for sharing operators, whereas a fleet consisting of 2500 vehicles exhibits the lowest environmental emissions per kilometer. Already with today’s grid mix, the use of shared e-mopeds results in a significant reduction in environmental impact compared to conventional and battery-electric passenger cars.

In battery electric buses (e-buses), the substantial energy consumption of the heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system can cause significant reductions of the available travel range. Additionally, HVAC systems are often operated at higher levels than what required for the thermal comfort of the passengers. Therefore, this paper proposes a method to experimentally investigate the influence of the HVAC system on the energy consumption and thermal comfort in a 12m e-bus. An appropriate thermal comfort model is identified and the required climatic input parameters are selected and measured with self-developed sensor stations. The energy consumption of the e-bus, the state of charge (SoC) of the battery and the available travel range are measured by an embedded data logger. Climatic measurements are then performed with heating on and off on a Berlin bus line in winter conditions. The results show that the energy consumption of the e-bus is increased by a factor of 1.9 with heating on, while both the SoC and travel range are reduced accordingly. Comparing the thermal comfort with heating on and off, a decrease from “comfortable” to “slightly uncomfortable but acceptable” is observed.

Bus operators around the world are facing the transformation of their fleets from fossil-fuelled to electric buses. Two technologies prevail: Depot charging and opportunity charging at terminal stops. Total cost of ownership (TCO) is an important metric for the decision between the two technologies; however, most TCO studies for electric bus systems rely on generalised route data and simplifying assumptions that may not reflect local conditions. In particular, the need to reschedule vehicle operations to satisfy electric buses’ range and charging time constraints is commonly disregarded. We present a simulation tool based on discrete-event simulation to determine the vehicle, charging infrastructure, energy and staff demand required to electrify real-world bus networks. These results are then passed to a TCO model. A greedy scheduling algorithm is developed to plan vehicle schedules suitable for electric buses. Scheduling and simulation are coupled with a genetic algorithm to determine cost-optimised charging locations for opportunity charging. A case study is carried out in which we analyse the electrification of a metropolitan bus network consisting of 39 lines with 4748 passenger trips per day. The results generally favour opportunity charging over depot charging in terms of TCO; however, under some circumstances, the technologies are on par. This emphasises the need for a detailed analysis of the local bus network in order to make an informed procurement decision.

For the purpose of utilizing electric bus fleets in metropolitan areas and with regard to providing active energy management at depots, a profound understanding of the transactions between the market entities involved in the charging process is given. The paper examines sophisticated charging strategies with energy procurements in joint market operation. Here, operation procedures and characteristics of a depot including the physical layout and utilization of appropriate charging infrastructure are investigated. A comprehensive model framework for a virtual power plant (VPP) is formulated and developed to integrate electric bus fleets in the power plant portfolio, enabling the provision of power system services. The proposed methodology is verified in numerical analysis by providing optimized dispatch schedules in day-ahead and intraday market operations.