Real-life driving tests on the world's first dynamic induction charging highway

This allows electric heavy goods vehicles, as well as all types of electric vehicles equipped with receivers, to recharge directly while driving.

Deployed on a large scale, this solution would make it possible to considerably reduce the size of vehicle batteries, thus improving the balance sheet of heavy electric mobility, both from an operational point of view (cheaper and lighter vehicles, with improved consumption and payload, elimination of downtime for recharging, etc.) and from an environmental point of view (reduction in the need for raw materials and the carbon footprint linked to battery manufacturing).

After laboratory tests to prequalify the materials, mechanical durability tests on a closed site, then work to install induction coils on 1,5 km of the A10 motorway, the project is now entering a new phase with the running of prototype vehicles on the motorway (a heavy goods vehicle, a utility vehicle, a car and a bus).

The world's first highway with dynamic induction charging

Winner in 2023 of a call for projects from Bpifrance, the experimental project for dynamic charging of electric vehicles is now entering its operational deployment phase: four vehicles equipped with receiver coils – a heavy goods vehicle, a utility vehicle, a car and a bus – are thus circulating on the pilot section of the A10 in order to test and evaluate the charging capacity of this section of electric motorway (Electric Road System or ERS).

Three laboratories[1] at Gustave Eiffel University were able to conduct on-site test campaigns in real traffic conditions. Their initial analyses of the data collected are already promising. The installed inductive system is capable of safely transferring instantaneous power levels above 300 kW and average power levels above 200 kW in an optimal steady state.

For Nicolas Notebaert, Managing Director of Concessions for the VINCI Group and Chairman of VINCI Autoroutes: "The initial results of the ongoing experiment on a section of the A10 motorway confirm the findings of previous studies. The deployment of such technology on France's main road networks would, in addition to charging stations, further accelerate the electrification of the heavy vehicle fleet, and therefore the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from the freight transport and logistics sector, which alone accounts for more than 16% of the country's greenhouse gas emissions."

Driving on the A10 concludes nearly two years of tests and laboratory trials

These tests follow the activities carried out by the consortium since September 2023 to ensure that operational and safety conditions were met before proceeding with the work to install the inductive system on the A10.

Several stages followed in order to allow driving in real traffic conditions:

• Numerous tests on the materials that could be used in the experiment were carried out at the VINCI Construction Road Trades Research Centre in Mérignac. Mechanical tests were carried out on the components of the inductive system and its interfaces with the road layers, in order to prequalify the most suitable materials for deployment on the A10;
• Full-scale tests were then carried out on a closed site in the LAMES laboratory of the Materials and Structures Department (MAST) of Gustave Eiffel University, in Bouguenais, Loire-Atlantique. Using traffic simulators (fatigue arena and FABAC machine), capable of reproducing in a few weeks the equivalent of at least 25 years of heavy goods vehicle traffic, the consortium was able to confirm the absence of premature wear of the road surface equipped with inductive systems. Once the necessary conditions had been met, both in mechanical and safety terms, regulatory and ministerial authorizations for deployment on the motorway could be issued, and the installation work on the A10 carried out.
• At the same time, Carbone 4 conducted a study on the environmental benefits of dynamic charging at the request of VINCI Autoroutes, in the form of a life cycle analysis of the carbon and material footprints of vehicles and infrastructure. This study confirms the strong potential of ERS in terms of carbon emission savings and raw material requirements.

The prototype vehicles used in the tests can now travel on the equipped section, merging into the flow of daily users of this section of the A10.

The electric highway: a mature technology for decarbonizing the transport and logistics sector

The transport sector alone accounts for a third of France's greenhouse gas emissions, and 95% come from road transport. Nearly 9 out of 10 goods are transported by road, and according to government projections in the National Low-Carbon Strategy, this share will remain the majority in the coming decades, even assuming a rise in rail freight and the optimization of logistics flows. It is therefore essential to decarbonize flows related to heavy goods vehicle travel, primarily through electrification, which represents a major challenge for long-distance road transport.

To ensure sufficient autonomy, batteries weighing several tonnes are now required, combined with charging points of up to 1 MW, to allow truck drivers to recharge during their journeys. In view of these constraints, the initial results of the experiment carried out on the A10 show that dynamic induction charging is one of the most promising solutions for accelerating the decarbonization of road freight transport, corroborating the study published by the Ministry of Transport in 2021. ERS make it possible to considerably reduce the size of batteries in electric heavy goods vehicles, thus limiting their cost and dependence on the raw materials that make them up, as well as the CO2 emissions associated with their manufacture.

Deployed on a large scale, the system currently being tested would significantly reduce CO2 emissions from road freight transport, both compared to the use of diesel and heavy goods vehicles carrying large capacity batteries and recharging at terminals.

Dynamic induction charging, which is also being tested and demonstrated in the United States, China, South Korea, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Norway, and Israel, is a technology that is reaching maturity. Its deployment on highways, for the first time in the world, represents a new essential step on the path to its future development.

This is all the more so as it is also particularly promising in terms of economic and industrial sovereignty, offering the potential to reduce European dependence on imports of batteries and the raw materials needed for their manufacture, as well as to create jobs and industrial activity in Europe, where the components of ERS systems can be manufactured.

[1] LAMES (Laboratory for Auscultation, Modeling, and Experimentation of Transport Infrastructures), based in Nantes; LEOST (Electronics, Waves, and Signals Laboratory for Transport), based in Lille; IMSE - Instrumentation, Modeling, Simulation, and Experimentation, based in Marne-La-Vallée.