Solar-powered truck charging gains ground on South Africa’s freight corridors

A file photo of workers offloading grains from a truck at the Mile 12 Market in Lagos, Nigeria. 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. — AP

NAIROBI, Kenya: 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.