Ross: You left Volta Trucks to start Decade Energy. How has the market evolved during that transition?

Carl-Magnus: When I started Volta Trucks, no one was talking about electric trucks. I remember at the IAA Commercial Vehicles 2018 (the biggest truck fair in Europe), the discussion around electrifying heavy-duty vehicles was nowhere on the program. Fast forward several years to the 2022 IAA, and all the truck manufacturers had an electric vehicle at the front of their booths. Volta Trucks helped push the big OEMs in this direction of electrification, and we enjoyed great support from customers, with letters of intent from 1,000 customers like Petit Forestier, 1,500 from DB Schenker, amongst others.

Ross: What about the electric heavy-duty vehicle (HDV) market in general?

Carl-Magnus: I believe that prices will go down quite dramatically, because it’s not logical that an electric vehicle with a simpler electric drivetrain should be more expensive to produce than a diesel vehicle. With the growing scale of EVs, they will get even cheaper. There's support for this among Scandinavian manufacturers, who want this electric transportation revolution to happen now.

Earlier in September 2024, Volvo Group announced a new long-range version of its FH Electric truck, which boasts a range of 600 kilometers. This would have been impossible four or five years ago. With battery costs continuously dropping, there's no doubt it will be even cheaper in the future. So, if OEMs can produce an electric HDV for a lower cost than a diesel one, then of course, why not?

On the demand side, commercial vehicle operators are increasingly placing orders to meet their carbon reduction goals. We're in a transitional phase as more sustainability commitments are made, and we need to build an enabling system to eliminate barriers to fleet electrification. For now, the missing link is having the right amount of electricity in the right place.

Ross: What do you mean by the “right place”?

Carl-Magnus: The depots where vehicles go to offload and reload goods. After that, we need to address the intermediary stops made during long-haul journeys. This is what Decade Energy solves for.

Ross: Can you give us a sense of the industry scale you're talking about? How many vehicles and depots are there, and what percentage are already electric?

Carl-Magnus: In Europe, there are about 6.5 million trucks and roughly 35 million vans. As of 2023, only around 10,000 of those trucks are electric, which is less than 1% of the market. Electric vans have seen somewhat wider adoption, representing about 4%. This underscores the massive growth potential in both the truck and van markets. Many companies are committed to carbon neutrality by 2040, and several cities across Europe aim to ban diesel deliveries by 2030. The question is: How do we achieve this, and what will the timeline look like?

Just a year or two ago, most fleet operators would have said there wasn’t any supply of electric trucks. Supply has been the biggest bottleneck so far, but OEMs are now stepping up. Electric trucks are expected to enter the market in 2025 and 2026, with leaders like Volvo already scaling up.

Ross: When it comes to practical electrification, depot managers are moving from the straightforward process of refueling with diesel to charging with electricity. What bottlenecks are there, and is it easy to get a new power line?

Carl-Magnus: Increasing power capacity takes time, and depot managers need to explore various options. Photovoltaic (PV) panels are an obvious solution—many depots have large parking areas and extensive roofing, which are ideal for solar energy production. Battery storage will also be essential to make the most of lower PV and battery costs. Once the costs of this infrastructure and the vehicles reach a sustainable level, there won’t be much reason to drive diesel trucks anymore. I believe it will take around three to four years for Europe to develop the infrastructure needed to fully electrify commercial fleets.

Ross: What role is Decade Energy playing to accelerate this transition?

Carl-Magnus: Let’s look at the main players involved: You have EVSE, PV manufacturers, and battery energy storage systems, each currently operating in silos. Ultimately, they all need to integrate with the grid. This is where Decade Energy comes in. Our goal is to connect these pieces by managing data flow from the trucks to the grid and optimizing the grid for this new demand.

The primary objective is to generate energy behind the meter, where the marginal cost is virtually zero. We assist fleet owners in assessing their options and planning effectively, with cost and emission reductions as key project goals. We can also support the construction, procurement, and installation of PV equipment, batteries, EVSE, and related infrastructure. Our long term vision is to develop software that integrates data from all these components, positioning us as a premium partner for the grid to make it as efficient as possible. 

Ross: How does Decade Energy propose to reduce energy costs and efficiently integrate the logistics network into the electricity infrastructure?

Carl-Magnus: I’ll answer with an anecdote. I spoke with one of the major energy players in Sweden a few weeks ago, and he told me, “Being an energy provider in Sweden has been a very stable business for many years. We had nuclear as the baseload and hydroelectric power as the top-up. So, the business attracted people who valued stability. But in recent years, on the supply side, we’ve seen the rise of renewable energy sources like wind and solar, which are inherently variable. On the demand side, you have the EV revolution, creating all sorts of demand uncertainty.”

This is a time of disruption and innovation for the industry. In the long run, vehicle-to-grid technology—especially with large truck batteries—could become important. To foster this innovation, regulatory adjustments will be needed. At Decade Energy, we aim to be the grid suppliers’ best friend. We can help stabilize the grid and potentially support it with battery storage capacity, facilitated by data and software systems that balance supply and demand.

Ross: Who are your clients? Depot managers, fleet managers, the grid? Or, in the future, could it even be the energy providers?

Carl-Magnus: We’re in the business of systems integration, so the answer is all of the above. For now, though, our focus is on depots, as they are often the most invested in this transition since they own the property. They recognize that the world is going electric, so it’s a matter of investing in this future for the long term. To do that, they need an experienced partner who can plan effectively and deliver savings over time.

Sometimes, the trigger for action from these fleet managers is that they’ve ordered five e-trucks from Volvo that are set to arrive in 10 months, and they realize they don’t have any charging infrastructure yet.

To meet the demand of this transitional phase, short term thinking is no longer sufficient.

And Decade Energy is positioned for the long term.