Kalmar, the forerunner in sustainable material handling equipment and services, partners with Elonroad, a Swedish cleantech company specialised in automatic charging technology for heavy vehicles, to build a 200-metre electric road for charging electric vehicles. The electric road, to be built at Kalmar’s Innovation Center in Ljungby, Sweden, enables electric vehicles to be charged dynamically both while moving and stationary through rails in the ground. This innovative solution would reduce the need for large batteries onboard the vehicles and grid capacity, while improving vehicle uptime.

Per-Erik Johansson, Technology Manager at Kalmar, said: “After some years of exploring and evaluating a dynamic charging solution for electric vehicles, we are now at a point where we are able to verify the technology. The project, supported by The Swedish Energy Agency, will initially retrofit a reachstacker and a terminal tractor from Kalmar, followed by a verification phase to test charging efficiency and uptime improvements on the electric road. In the second stage of the project, the technology will be tested in a real-life port environment with pilot customers.”

Tommi Pettersson, SVP Strategy, Sustainability and Technology at Kalmar, said: “At Kalmar we have always been the forerunner in new technologies and innovative solutions to provide value for our customers, which is why this collaboration is so interesting. Together with Elonroad, we can be the first on the market to demonstrate a charging solution of “unlimited onboard energy”.”

Karin Ebbinghaus, CEO at Elonroad, said: “At the heart of this project is an innovative solution that combines Elonroad’s technology for automatic charging with Kalmar’s expertise in port and terminals, distribution centres and industrial applications. By collaborating with Kalmar, we hope to contribute to solutions that are not only better for the environment, but also improve efficiency and reduce costs worldwide. This is the future of industrial infrastructure – smart, sustainable and economically viable.”