NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Africa’s freight corridors, long dominated by diesel trucks and constrained by unreliable power grids, are emerging as a new frontier in the global shift toward clean logistics, with solar-powered charging hubs designed specifically for heavy-duty electric trucks.
In Africa, Cape Town-based Zero Carbon Charge, or Charge, is pioneering this technology. It follows global models such as WattEV in California and Milence, a joint venture between Germany’s Daimler Truck and Volvo, which have built solar-powered truck charging hubs to support high-capacity freight charging.
Charge is rolling out two fully off-grid, solar-powered electric vehicle charging stations along South Africa’s busiest freight and passenger corridor between Johannesburg and Durban, following a pilot that successfully fully charged a heavy-duty electric truck using only solar energy.
The rollout along the 570-kilometer (354-mile) N3 highway — a key artery linking the country’s economic hub with its main port — is backed by a $6.2 million equity investment from the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA). The funding, announced last July, was conditional on the company building off-grid charging infrastructure every 150 kilometers (90 miles) along national roads.
Charge said the two stations will be completed by June, enabling long-distance EV travel along one of South Africa’s busiest transport routes.
The company's co-founder, Joubert Roux, said the next phase will focus on the N1 corridor connecting Johannesburg and Cape Town, extending off-grid, ultra-fast charging across South Africa’s main long-distance routes.
Each off-grid site costs about $1.25 million.
“This investment allows us to move from pilot projects to full-scale rollouts,” Roux said. “We have proven that it’s possible to fully charge electric trucks using solar energy, and now we are building the infrastructure to do that commercially and reliably.”
Charge successfully demonstrated its capacity to link clean energy with freight transport in January when it simultaneously charged two heavy-duty electric trucks supplied by China's SANY Trucks alongside four passenger EVs.
Other clean transport companies in Africa have mostly focused on electric motorbikes. Companies such as Kenya's Spiro and Ampersand have integrated renewable energy into parts of their battery-swapping infrastructure, particularly outside major cities. However, they are hybrid systems rather than fully off-grid solar networks designed for heavy trucks.
South Africa's imports of EVs have been rising, but charging infrastructure remains limited and largely concentrated in major cities. Heavy-duty electric trucks face additional hurdles due to high energy requirements and a shortage of high-capacity charging sites, even as the national utility struggles to meet demand.
“Our approach is to build energy-resilient charging hubs that are not dependent on an unstable grid,” Roux said. “By combining solar and storage, we can provide predictable, clean power for fleets.”
Roux said adoption of electric freight technology still faces several risks, including regulatory delays for site approvals, high import duties, truck certification requirements and limited vehicle availability.
“Fleet operators are under pressure to decarbonize, but they need commercially viable solutions,” Roux said. “This investment helps us deploy infrastructure for logistics, mining and long-haul transport. We believe this model can reduce emissions while strengthening energy security.”
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FILE -A man rides an electric motorcycle from Ampersand on a test drive in Nairobi, Kenya, Jan. 23, 2023. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga, File)
FILE -Workers offload grains from a truck at the Mile 12 Market in Lagos, Nigeria, Feb. 16, 2024. AP Photo/Mansur Ibrahim, File)
