Self-Powered Trailers Promise Leaner Freight Runs

rrbanffy 10 days ago 60 commentsRead Article on spectrum.ieee.org

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WindyTree•about 20 hours ago

In the US, commercial trailers are used like these crappy sheds, you go get one and the ABS unit is gone, the only thing worth stealing. For any company where this doesn’t hold it’s a big deal. The bigger deal is really RV trailers. You power assist, with simple motors controlled by pulling, and you can pull a huge one with ANY car, you don’t need truck, just modified mirrors. Plus the RV trailer benefits from slow self movement and power wall when disconnected. Total off grid tiny home.

_blk•about 19 hours ago

In practice it's of course not so simple. Every truck that passes you (or that you pass) will suck you right in if your tow vehicle isn't heavy enough or you don't have good enough grip. Also, (RV/drum) trailer brakes suck so hard that you really want a vehicle with some additional stopping power other than regular brakes (heavy duty transmission, big engine, and diesel exhaust or compression brake). E-brakes work well so there the e-assist trailer has a real advantage if it can do that but you'll have to get used to the feeling of being pulled back rather than leading the stop... So evy 6.7l diesel I tow a big RV and e-assistance would be very welcome but costs likely drastically reduce the attractiveness of such a system for an RV. For a trailer that's constantly on the road I can definitely see a use case but it's not to be towed by a (comparatively) tiny car

just_some_user•about 20 hours ago

Cool, but I don’t see the real benefit. Electronic trucks already work quite well, start at around 150k (vs. 150k for a retrofitted e trailer), and are afaik mostly limited by the charging infrastructure. If you now add a an electronic trailer to your diesel truck, you now also have to care about charging.

Yes, in Europe the legally required rest periods can already be used for efficient charging, but this is not an benefiting exclusiv to the trailers, but for general electronic trucking.

sandworm101•about 19 hours ago

Charging time. A truck/driver doesnt remain stopped. It drops a trailer and picks up another. And a truck needs charging on the open road where there just are not any charging stations. But a trailer remains parked at a loading bay for hours, a commercial facility where installing chargers makes sense. A trailer therefore has more oppertunity to charge than a truck.

And if a company wanted to, parking a trailer to let it charge is far cheaper than paying a truck/driver to sit around.

crote•about 18 hours ago

But that's the thing: you already have to pay a driver to sit around!

In Europe there's (simplified) a mandatory 45-minute rest break after 4.5 hours of driving. Similarly, there's a mandatory 11-hour rest period after the daily maximum of 10 hours of driving. And it is very strictly enforced, with every commercial truck having been equipped with a sealed and certified data logger, plenty of random checks by traffic police, and heavy fines for any kind of violation.

If the truck is already sitting idle ~half of the time due to driver rest requirements, why not take that opportunity to charge it as well? Similarly, if you are building the usual highway-side rest stop with truck parking, a petrol station, and a restaurant, why not add a charging station as well? It can even do double-duty as rapid car charger!

jordiburgos•about 5 hours ago

It saves 7000 L of diesel on one year, but what is it compared to the spending in total? What is the percentage of saving?

clintonbush•about 13 hours ago

It'd be nice if researchers compared the impact on environment of disposing of the batteries (toxic metals, chemicals, other components) with the impact on the environment of the truck burning fossil fuels. In the end, what's the net benefit? Maybe it's great, I don't know. I feel we're getting a very one-sided assessment, though.

torpfactory•about 13 hours ago

These are old talking points from the fossil fuel industry. The batteries themselves will be recycled to recover their valuable minerals. The process will certainly require care to avoid localized pollution. Compare that with burning fossil fuels- baked into their design is emission of heat trapping gasses which systemically affect the entire planet. It’s clear we need to stop burning fossil fuels lest we overheat the earth.

jazzyjackson•about 2 hours ago

It is not a given that recycling lithium will be economical, if it’s more expensive than manufacturing new why bother?

black_puppydog•about 13 hours ago

That's what's called a life cycle assessment and these are standard in products like this for a long time. If they came out negatively, you can be damn sure that the fossil fuel industry would make us know.

actionfromafar•about 13 hours ago

CO2 increasing is a pretty one-sided and horrible effect, too. It's by far the dominant problem.

iterateoften•about 13 hours ago

OP is asking about the environment impact of manufacturing this.

Like the whole supply chain for these trailers produce CO2 for each trailer it outputs.

I had a similar thought as my city replaced 500,000 curb side recycling bins because of the color. How many years of my personal environmental savings did that operation cost? They had people flown in from the other side of the country for months just to offload the bins from the trailers.

At what point does the second and third order side effects action offset the benefits.

shrubble•about 13 hours ago

The placement of the Krone pack in the photo at link, makes me laugh: it would never survive in the USA, given the way truck drivers drive and the bumps and curbs etc. that trucks drive over. It would be ripped off or at least heavily damaged within 50K miles.

bluGill•about 13 hours ago

Maybe some truck drivers. However there are also a lot of trailers in the US that hang even lower than this appears to. The most common situation is trailers have a lot of space between the floor and the ground - so a forklift can drive all the way in. However some trailers - those used for house moving for example - have much lower floors. They have more space inside which is good for lighter things you are putting on the trailer by hand.

ErroneousBosh•about 13 hours ago

So, what you're saying is, we should be preventing shitty drivers from operating 40-tonne lorries?

nativeit•about 13 hours ago

Brave new world for the kinds of people who steal catalytic converters and the copper off air conditioners!

raulandrisan•about 20 hours ago

I think a cool application is that someone with a remote control could park these or manipulate them in the logistics park while the tractor trucks can immediately pick a different trailer and leave

Animats•about 20 hours ago

That adds a lot of complexity. You'd need a steerable axle somewhere, for starters.

The usual tool for this is a mini-truck called a "yard goat".[1] There are also forklift attachments for this job.

[1] https://www.totalwarehouse.com/lonestar-battery-powered-trac...

WindyTree•about 20 hours ago

AI could largely do that.

bob1029•about 19 hours ago

I have a hard time seeing this adopted in many markets due to overall system complexity and weird new edge cases.

Trailers are supposed to be pretty dumb. This is what makes them valuable from a logistical perspective. If we hyper focus on reducing the carbon footprint of each specific shipment we may find we created an overall increase in aggregate once the higher order and deferred consequences come to bear.

1ncorrect•about 20 hours ago

These paired with Janus Electric[0] conversions would make a hell of a road train.

[0]: https://januselectric.com/

jnovacho•about 19 hours ago

This trailer saves 7000l of diesel per year. Assuming 40l/100km, with this trailer you can go ~17.000 km more, which is 11-17% more, for the same fuel cost. Or ~12-15k EUR in fuel savings per year (assuming 1.8EUR/l).

With 13+ years ROI (electricity is not free) is this really beneficial?

wodenokoto•about 18 hours ago

Maybe you shouldn’t throw out your new trailer, but it looks like a good deal for expanding a fleet.

Remember that all signs point towards more CO2 fees and higher gas prices in the coming years

mschuster91•about 18 hours ago

> With 13+ years ROI (electricity is not free) is this really beneficial?

Regenerative and solar electricity is free, and regen braking additionally saves wear and tear on brake pads.

The real benefit I think is when stuff like tax codes, carbon credits and government subsidies come into play and ROI goes down significantly.

Or when the next war hits and diesel actually hits and bypasses the 2.50€/l mark.

Gabrys1•about 16 hours ago

Even a version without AC charging (just solar + regen) with a smaller battery seems like a good deal

sneak•about 16 hours ago

The amount of solar power available to the square area on top of a trailer is negligible compared to the energy required to haul it long distances. Regen braking would probably only be worth it in some limited circumstances.

RetroTechie•about 14 hours ago

"Pavel Gilman, vice president of sales and marketing at Nivalis, breaks down where those savings come from: roughly 30 to 35 percent from the electric axle during braking and deceleration, 11 to 15 percent from the rooftop solar panels, and the remainder (roughly half) from grid charging during parking stops."

11..15% Is not the bulk of the energy. But it's significantly more than "negligible".

Note that this trailer could be expected to be on the road most of the time. Which may not even be the common case: demand for goods varies a lot, so I'd expect that a lot of logistics companies aren't fully booked all the time. Maybe have a few drivers/trucks on the road, and a bunch of trailers on a parking lot doing nothing. In that scenario: need a trailer? Use whichever one is charged up furthest, while at a loading dock top it up (grid power/in-building storage) to whatever is needed to complete the trip, off it goes.

Also for US-based naysayers: Europe is a very different environment than the US. Most long hauls aren't that long, and there's a lot of [industrial zone local distribution center] <-> inner city traffic. Read: lots of start-stop, low speed cornering & wait time.

fragmede•about 15 hours ago

What's your math on regen braking only being worth it. in limited circumstances?

SonOfKyuss•about 17 hours ago

It’s an interesting idea. A company called Hyliion https://www.hyliion.com/ tried something similar here in the US about 10 years ago. Unfortunately, they weren’t able to have success in the market and ended up pivoting to power generation for data centers.