WattEV has completed the construction of a public truck charging station at the Port of Long Beach in California.
According to the company, it is the largest public truck charging station in the U.S. and is scheduled to open for public use in the week of May 15. Located adjacent to the Pier-A terminal in the Port of Long Beach, the charging depot is designed to serve heavy-duty electric trucks with routes connecting to inland destinations throughout Southern California.
WattEV’s e-truck charging plaza features 26 charging bays that use combined charging system (CCS) connectors, providing power at up to 360 kW. The CCS system is the current charging standard for heavy-duty electric trucks, while faster charging systems are under development.
The public truck charging station is many of many decarbonization projects happening at the Port of Long Beach, one of the world's busiest such ports. Late last year, the U.S. Department of Energy approved Port of Long Beach for about $30 million in grants to support electrification cargo handling equipment which is currently diesel powered. Contractor SSA Marine also completed electrification of gantry cranes at the Pier J terminal.
WattEV notes that the facility will support the first batch of 14 Nikola electric trucks that will operate on its zero-emission fleet-transportation platform. The fleet is expected to expand to over 100 electric trucks by the end of 2023, with the opening of additional charging depots in Southern California.
The new charging depot aims to enable transporters to transition to zero-emission trucking and help the combined ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles achieve their goal of having 100-percent zero-emission trucks serving the ports by 2035. The ports have approximately 20,000 trucks in their registries, and more than 25 percent of them are over 10 years old.
See more stories on Decarbonization at the Port of Long Beach
Port of Los Angeles joins Global Green Shipping Corridor
Read our latest newsletter: BlackRock CEO on Barriers to Net Zero and more
WattEV plans to open more charging depots in California, including warehouse districts in nearby Gardena and inland near San Bernardino. The company says it also plans to incrementally connect the charging station with all the major freight routes throughout California, Oregon, Arizona and Nevada, serving electric truck operations throughout the San Pedro Bay ports complex.
Additionally, WattEV says it plans to add four more pass-through e-truck bays at the Port of Long Beach charging plaza when trucks with megawatt charging capability become available. These bays will use the megawatt charging system (MCS), which is designed to provide faster and higher-power charging and can deliver up to 1.2 MW of power.
According to the company, the MCS is expected to become the worldwide standard for fast charging of medium and heavy-duty commercial vehicles, reducing typical charge sessions to less than 30 minutes.
