Running all Trucks from Electricity is Possible

With oil prices reaching new heights, it is time to suggest somewhat outlandish ideas in order to curtail the use of diesel in our transportation systems.  So with this in mind, consider: a system of electrification on limited access highways that could power trucks.  From a technical feasibility standpoint, it doesn’t seem too difficult.  Power lines could be hung above the right lane on the highway, and trucks could extend a pantograph from the top of the truck to electrical lines above while driving along the highway, and then retract this pantograph when leaving the highway.  A battery could be charged from the overhead lines and when the vehicle needs to operate off the highway to make trips to shippers, receivers, and other yards, the vehicle could utilize battery power.  Local delivery vehicles would still have to run off of diesel to some extent, due to the proportion of time that they spend off highway, but long distance trucks in corridors like the 401 could easily be accommodated to run on purely electric power because they do not travel more than a few kilometres from highways the vast majority of the time. 

Today, Robert Transport is beginning the use of trucks powered by natural gas on the 401 corridor, at a large expense because of the cost of the new technologies.  Electric trucks would be expensive as well, but electric vehicles last for extremely long periods of time (how old are the TTC streetcars now?)  For all those who say that electric vehicles are only as good as the source of the power that they draw from, I would argue that this is false for two reasons.  First, if the source of electric power is to be changed, then it requires governments to make massive investments that take decades to be completed, but are still easier then trying to replace a decentralized, retail fuelling network with something else.  A coal plant can be retrofitted with clean coal technology; renewables can be brought on line and used to power the transportation system.  Secondly, electric engines are a lot more efficient than internal combustion engines. An internal combustion engine converts fuel to movement at a rate of 15% while an electric engine operates at 88%.[1]  This is because electric engines don’t have to spend energy on moving oils, coolants, pistons and valves around the engine, the power goes straight to the wheels. 

Would anything like this ever actually be feasible?  Well, if you believe in peak oil (I just filled up for $1.12/L), solutions like these begin to be more appealing.  As long as the transportation authority goes along with the idea and the money that transportation companies spend on buying fuel could go into paying off the cost of constructing the system, why not?  If Robert transport can coordinate the establishment of their own natural gas fuelling network along the 401, why can’t large carriers get together and create their own electric power authority that could construct such a system and extract rents from carriers to use it, decoupling the freight transportation system from oil? 

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[1]  Source: ‘Debunking the Myth of EVs and Smokestacks.’ At: http://www.electroauto.com/info/pollmyth.shtml