Battery trucks for electric vehicles

Any time you read a story about electric motorcycles, the reviewer usually ends with something like this: “It’s a fun bike, but battery range is limited.” But now, an American Automobile Association project may help with that.

Battery power is the greatest limiting factor for electric vehicles. Nobody wants to be stuck outside Muskrat Flats city limits with a dead battery, and no way to charge it. Now, the AAA is working on a partial solution to the problem; according to Wired magazine, they’re bringing out a fleet of trucks capable of charging your electric vehicle’s dead battery.

Obviously, even with quick charge options becoming more readily available on electric vehicles, the truck isn’t going to give you a full charge – they don’t fill your gas tank when you run out on the highway, either. But as long as you have a compatible plug, they should be able to juice up your machine enough to get to a charging station.

This may be new to North America, but it isn’t ground-breaking – this service showed up in Japan in June.

At first, this service will only be available in six U.S. cities, which certainly doesn’t do us Canadians any good. And of course, they’re an automobile association, not a bike service.

But, this could be a major factor in the push to get more electric vehicles on the road. The AAA says they plan to bring the service to more cities as demand grows and electric vehicle sales increase. Maybe, when the service eventually makes it to Canada, that battery bike will suddenly seem a lot more attractive.