Short circuit
The push by California and federal regulators to mandate the sale and use of electric heavy-duty trucks is cause for concern – especially for the long-haul sector of trucking.
The Environmental Protection Agency permitted California to require that half of all new heavy-duty sales be electric trucks by 2035. This made California the only state to have stricter emission regulations than the federal government.
As with nearly any state mandate, the trickledown effect is fully in play. Several other states have lined up to adopt their version of California’s emission requirements. They now wait for the EPA’s blessing.
The ‘zero-emission’ argument
Electric vehicles are commonly called “zero-emission” vehicles. Technically, they are “zero-direct-emission” vehicles. That is a term used by the Department of Energy to evaluate and measure vehicle emissions.
Emissions are evaluated on a tailpipe basis, a well-to-wheel basis and a cradle-to-grave basis. The tailpipe basis is pretty straightforward. It is the measurement of tailpipe emissions of any vehicle.
But tailpipe emissions are only one factor in considering a vehicle’s life-cycle emissions. Electricity-fuel pathways also have upstream emissions to consider, which include extracting, refining, producing and transporting the fuel.
Well-to-wheel emissions are all of the pollutants and greenhouse gases generated from fuel production, processing, distribution and use. According to the Department of Energy, in the case of electricity, most electric power plants produce emissions, and there are “additional emissions associated with the extraction, processing and distribution of the primary energy sources” used for electricity production.
Cradle-to-grave accounts for all the emissions associated with a vehicle, from its production, energy source and use to its recycling and scrapping.
So, while electric trucks may be “zero-direct-emission” vehicles, they most certainly leave an emission footprint in other ways. What exactly that footprint is over the life cycle of a heavy-duty truck seems to be elusive to researchers, with studies on cradle-to-grave emissions virtually nonexistent.
The shortcoming for long haul
Long-haul trucking generally is considered any route over 250 miles. With most electric heavy-duty trucks limited to a 400-mile range on a single charge, that really doesn’t bode well for electric trucks in the long-haul sector.
Even California regulators appear to acknowledge this fact. The mandated sale of electric trucks has Class 4-8 sales at only 40% of all sales by 2035, while electric Class 2b-3 truck sales are to account for 75%.
Some point to the push to increase the charging infrastructure as a gateway to getting electric trucks out on longer runs. But charging times come into play.
Truckers have a finite number of hours a day that can be spent driving. Any time away from driving is largely uncompensated. For company drivers, a 90-minute charging cycle is lost income.
About that infrastructure
The availability of charging stations for light-duty vehicles remains a problem.
A 2022 J.D. Power study took a deep dive into public charging options for EVs. Less than two years ago, the picture was bleak.
“Despite that more public charging stations are in operation than ever before, customer satisfaction with public Level 2 charging declined from last year, dropping to 633 (on a 1,000-point scale) from 643 in 2021, while satisfaction with the speedier DC (direct current) fast-charger segment remains flat at 674,” the study stated. “This lack of progress points to the need for improvement as EVs gain wider consumer acceptance, because the shortage of public charging availability is the No. 1 reason vehicle shoppers reject EVs.”
Perpetuating the parking problem
The Biden administration is investing heavily in beefing up the charging infrastructure, to the tune of $7.5 billion. But building out the charging infrastructure will create additional problems for truckers by reducing available parking capacity.
It’s no secret that there is a truck parking shortage in the U.S. Incremental improvements are being made, albeit very slowly. Charging stations and the necessary infrastructure to power them take up space, though – precious space current parking facilities do not have to spare.
“We definitely don’t have enough places to put chargers,” OOIDA Executive Vice President Lewie Pugh recently told The Washington Post. “If you can’t answer that for an automobile, for heaven’s sake, forget it for a truck.”
To make matters worse: Due to the weight of electric trucks, another 343 trucks will be needed for every 1,000 trucks currently on the road in order to meet freight demands, according to a study by the American Transportation Research Institute.
Reliability also comes into play. The current charging infrastructure is frequently inoperable. Factor in situations like natural disasters and a taxed electric grid that still has power companies performing rolling blackouts during peak usage, and there is little confidence a plentiful and reliable infrastructure will be in place any time soon.
Sticker shock
With many truckers operating on razor-thin profit margins, the ATRI study’s estimated price tag of $425,000 per electric truck is going to be a big no-go. Especially when you consider the fact that is more than double the cost of a conventional diesel-powered truck.
The study, which specifically looked at California, also pointed out that the cost to power an electric truck could be as high as $1.21 per mile – again, nearly double the cost of diesel.
Absent major advancements in technology, without adding more weight or cost to electric trucks, the dominance of electric trucks in the long-haul segment of the industry is just not feasible any time soon.
Join the fight
OOIDA has been critical of efforts to force consumers into buying electric vehicles before a national charging infrastructure is created and other concerns are addressed. Go to FightingForTruckers.com to contact your lawmaker about the issue. LL