Volvo's Electric Roads Concept Points To Battery-Free EV Future

Zothecula writes "While quick charging technology installed at strategic points along a planned route might be a good fit for inner city buses, it's not going to be of much use to electric vehicles that stop infrequently. Volvo sees our future long-haul trucks and buses drawing the juice they need from the road itself, making large onboard batteries a thing of the past. 'The two power rails/lines run along the road's entire length. One is a positive pole, and the other is used to return the current. The lines are sectioned so that live current is only delivered to a collector mounted at the rear of, or under, the truck if an appropriate signal is detected. As an additional safety measure, the current flows only when the vehicle is moving at speeds greater than 60 km/h (37 mph). "The vehicle is equipped with a radio emitter, which the road segments can sense," explains Volvo's Per-Martin Johnansson. "If an electric vehicle passes a road segment with a proper encrypted signal, then the road will energize the segments that sense the vehicle.'"

Comments

Many problems, but not impossible

[Animats]

This has been tried before. It's called a ground level power supply. Trams in Bordeaux use it. The sections are powered on and off in 8-meter sections. When a section is off, it's grounded. For safety, there are two levels of switching. The 8-meter sections each have their own power control box, and there's a second level of control which monitors a number of sections and will cut power for many sections if something is live that shouldn't be. The trams have battery backup so they can get through dead sections. Bordeaux only uses the system in their scenic historic area. Once out of that area, the trams raise pantographs to connect to overhead wire. Two other small cities in France have installed that system, but only short sections in the city center use that system. Dubai is putting in 14km of a similar system.

Drainage, water, and ice are big problems. (Not in Dubai, though.) So is cost. There's a lot of high-voltage switchgear involved.