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World’s first dynamic wirelessly-charged motorway shows highly promising results

On the A10 motorway, around 40 kilometers southwest of Paris, a consortium led by VINCI Autoroutes in collaboration with Electreon, VINCI Construction, Gustave Eiffel University, and Hutchinson, has launched the Charge as you drive project —the first in the world to implement a dynamic induction charging system on a motorway in live traffic.
The system enables electric heavy-duty vehicles—and any electric vehicle equipped with receivers—to recharge directly from the road while driving.
At scale, this solution could significantly reduce vehicle battery size, which would improve the overall performance of heavy electric mobility in several ways.
Vehicles would become less expensive, lighter, and more energy-efficient, with greater carrying capacity, and no downtime for charging.
The environmental benefits would also be substantial, with lower raw-material needs and a smaller carbon footprint from battery manufacturing.
Following laboratory tests to prequalify materials and mechanical durability trials on a closed site, induction coils were installed over 1.5 km of roadway on the A10.
The project is now entering a new phase, with prototype vehicles — including a heavy-duty truck, a utility vehicle, a passenger car, and a bus — driving on the motorway under real traffic conditions.
“The initial results of the ongoing trials on a section of the A10 motorway confirm the findings of previous studies. Deploying this technology on France’s main road networks, in addition to charging stations, will further accelerate the electrification of heavy-vehicle fleet s— and thereby reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the freight and logistics sector, which alone accounts for more than 16% of the country’s total emissions,”said Nicolas Notebaert, chief executive officer of VINCI Concessions and president of VINCI Autoroutes.