Yes, you read that right. The electrification of heavy-duty vehicles in Europe and the United States has recently started to bear the brunt of the extremely stringent charging standard design, which is called the Megawatt Charging System (MCS) in the industry, with a maximum voltage of 1250 V and the highest current is 3000A-no more zeros are written.

On the dividing line between fast charging, ultra-fast charging, and high-power fast charging, the bottom line is 50kW, 100kW, and 150kW, while the bottom line of MCS is 1000kW, which is megawatt-level charging.

The application objects of MCS are mainly trucks, ships, or cargo planes in the logistics industry, which is a future-oriented solution. According to the European heavy vehicle environmental protection proposal, a friendly interface and fast high-power charging is the key to improving electrification in this field. In order to meet the market demand of the truck and bus industry to recharge heavy vehicles within a reasonable time, MCS is a necessary high-power charging solution.

The investment in charging facilities in Europe is the next step, which will support the penetration rate of electric heavy vehicles in Europe.

This time node is actually very fast. We see ABB's 3MW MCS development (1000V&3000A, 1250V is optional), which will come out in 2022.

Many people will definitely doubt that the 3000A current is too huge, which requires the plug and socket to be cooled at the same time, as shown in the following table.

September 23, 2020, is a milestone time node in the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), representatives of different industries tested, fed back, and evaluated the compatibility of MCS charger plugs and connectors. The event included testing seven-vehicle plugs and eleven charging sockets.

2021 is a key node. With the models of Tesla, Daimler, and Volvo entering the final sprint, the first batch of MCS-based heavy vehicles will soon enter the end customer market in 2022.

American start-up company WattEV received 5 million U.S. dollars to build a 4 MW EV truck charging station in Bakersfield, California. The source of this funding is the California Energy Commission, which is one of the first solar-powered truck charging stations dedicated to heavy-duty electric trucks in California. This facility covers an area of 110 acres and has 40 charging locations, with a solar + energy storage capacity of up to 25 MW and a charging capacity of 40 MW. The project will be equipped with light, medium, and heavy charging piles with capacities of 250 kilowatts, 350 kilowatts, and 1 megawatt. A 1 MW charging pile can charge a purely electric truck for 320 miles in 30 minutes.

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