Germany looks to electric trucks to fight against urban emissions

Germany is looking at new plans to tackle the issue of emission levels from heavy-vehicles: to exempt electric trucks from truck tolls. The exemption from the tolls would start next year, in 2019. Estimates suggest that the effect could be savings of around €5,000 depending on the actual routes taken. The plans have been developed in the context of improving air quality in cities. German cities are more and more active in looking for ways to improve the conditions in their areas. Federal Transport Minister Andreas Scheuer stated that “electric trucks will be exempt from the truck tolls from 1st of January 2019. This is a great incentive for transport companies to switch to green vehicles.”

In general, heavy trucks were hardly considered in the context of electrifying transport before 2017. Only the Chinese provider BYD offered e-trucks of different kinds ranging from flatbed trucks, box trucks to garbage trucks. With its new plans for the truck toll exemption, Germany could become a test bed for all companies that are making early moves in the field of electric trucks. Moreover, the German plan promises emission reductions in urban areas, since an average heavy truck is consuming up to 40 times the fuel that an average person-vehicle would need.

Alongside the truck toll exemption for electric trucks, Germany is also about to expand the road network that is subject to the truck toll. From the current situation of about 15,000 km of highways subject to the toll, Germany will add a further 40,000 km of federal roads to the scheme. This increases the attractiveness of using electric vehicles for heavy good transportation.

The German government now hopes that its plans will convince fleet managers to look into the electrification of their fleets early than they would otherwise have done.

Story first published by “cleantechnica.com” on 30th of April 2018.