Electrify America and NFI open heavy-duty charging infrastructure project
28 February 2024
Electrify America and NFI , a leading North American third-party logistics provider, announced the grand opening of NFI’s state-of-the-art DC fast charging facility in Ontario, CA. Supporting NFI’s fleet of 50 heavy-duty electric trucks, the project advances the electrification of drayage operations between the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. The new charging facility will feature roughly 7MW of charging capacity shared across a total of 38 chargers, capable of speeds up to 350 kW for capable trucks.
When fully completed later this year, the depot will be coupled with nearly 4MW (nearly 8MWh) of onsite battery energy storage and approximately 1MW of solar power, helping to promote vehicle-grid integration and reduce stress on the grid by shifting energy usage to off-peak times.
The charging depot will also feature microgrid functionality, allowing for charging resiliency for fleet operations even when utility power is otherwise unavailable. The capability of the cumulative charging, energy storage, and solar power capacity at the charging depot exceeds the reported peak load of the Empire State Building at roughly 10MW.
The grand opening of the NFI facility complements Electrify America’s second Green City investment to advance charging electrification for public transit and heavy-duty electric vehicles in the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, among other areas of the Wilmington neighborhood in the City of Los Angeles.
In addition to NFI and Electrify America’s investments, the project is funded by the Joint Electric Truck Scaling Initiative (JETSI) between the California Air Resources Board, California Energy Commission, Mobile Source Air Pollution Reduction Review Committee, Port of Long Beach, Southern California Edison, and South Coast Air Quality Management District.
JETSI is an initiative that will deploy 100 Class 8 battery-electric trucks across Southern California to demonstrate strategies to scale market penetration of zero-emission technologies successfully. JETSI is the first battery-electric truck project jointly funded by the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and California Energy Commission (CEC), which together awarded the project $27 million.
Additional funding was provided by South Coast Air Quality Management District, Mobile Source Air Pollution Reduction Review Committee (MSRC), Port of Long Beach, and Southern California Edison.
Great test project, as the Port of Los Angeles is also the epicentre of Toyota and others efforts to use hydrogen and fuel cells in trucking.
Drayage is a good application for BEVs, as the runs are relatively short.
Much depends on the duty cycles, as you still get a lot more downtime from charging than refuelling with hydrogen.
So we will end up with real world comparative data, which is great.
Lots of things sound good on paper, and just don't pan out.
Good test for both battery and hydrogen charging and fuelling.
Posted by: Davemart | 28 February 2024 at 03:29 AM
I don't think that BEVs still need to be tested, with double-digit market share in most Western countries and in China, and millions of units in-use every day. That goes double in California where it seems like every second car is a Tesla, and half the rest are also EVs.
What's unique about this charging station (for the US) is the battery backup, which allows them to spread the load over time. That's especially important when you know that electric tractors can take a full 350kW charge, and they are deploying 38 chargers.
Similar solutions are already common in other parts of the world. You can quickly deploy charging stations that are trailers with batteries in order to test demand at new locations without increasing the electrical supply. This allows charging suppliers to estimate demand more accurately before building a permanent station (which has longer lead times).
Posted by: Bernard | 28 February 2024 at 06:01 AM
@Bernard:
We are not talking about cars, but heavy duty transport, albeit over limited distances.
And the 'inevitable triumph' of batteries everywhere for everything seems to be as unaccountably delayed as the triumph of the proletariat.
For an application as simple as fork lifts in warehouses, the battle between fuel cells and batteries is still continuing ten years or so in.
The answer to what works is often 'it depends' and absolutists for whatever are perhaps rather misunderstanding the question.
Posted by: Davemart | 28 February 2024 at 06:13 AM
Davemart,
It's just a deployment of what's already used in Europe. I'm not sure where you got "inevitable triumph" from, definitely not from the article or from what I wrote. There's no mention of fuel cells at all.
Posted by: Bernard | 28 February 2024 at 07:14 AM
@Bernard said:
' I'm not sure where you got "inevitable triumph" from,'
If it ain't, that is why you test against hydrogen fuelling for the same application, which you seem to think is not worth bothering with, presuming that batteries will win.
But that is what is happening, as experts in the field, who you have rightly said elsewhere should be listened to, are trying both.
Posted by: Davemart | 28 February 2024 at 01:55 PM
Davemart,
Once again, this article has nothing to do with hydrogen fuel cells. It is about using proven off-the-shelf solutions to solve very real problems in the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.
I'm sure that somebody suggested hydrogen as a "solution," but even you can see why it doesn't meet their short-term or long-term needs. It's not available right now in sufficient volumes, it would be extremely hard to scale for such large ports, it's not cost-competitive (especially running costs that are so critical to trucking). The usual claimed advantages of hydrogen don't even apply: the weather is very mild (a particular obsession of yours), and the area is very developed.
Executive summary: this story is about implementing proven solutions today, at competitive costs. It has nothing to do with unproven tech that won't be ready for wide-scale deployment for another decade. Maybe they'll consider fuel cells then, or maybe something else, who knows? They need a solution now, and they need a solution that they can afford.
Posted by: Bernard | 29 February 2024 at 06:10 AM
@Bernard:
On the contrary it is BEVs for drayage that are unproven in the Port of Los Angeles.
FCEVs work fine:
https://www.truckinginfo.com/10181655/fcev-drayage-trucks-prove-themselves-in-la-port-demonstration-project
Cars running on batteries are not the same as applying batteries and charging to drayage.
Posted by: Davemart | 29 February 2024 at 11:09 AM
@Bernard said:
' Once again, this article has nothing to do with hydrogen fuel cells.'
The article is about low or zero emission drayage from the Port of LA.
Hence it seems there is reasonable connection to alternatives.
If the comments section on this site were very busy, I probably would not have made the post.
Since it is not, then some discussion seems preferable to none.
Posted by: Davemart | 29 February 2024 at 11:27 AM