The cost of building a battery-powered truck will “forever be higher” than a combustion engine equivalent, the boss of the world’s largest truckmaker has warned, as the war in Ukraine accelerates an already rapid rise in the price of crucial commodities.
“If you take the entirety of engine, transmission, axle, tank system, cooling?.?.?.?” the chief executive officer of Daimler Truck, Martin Daum, told the Financial Times, “we have a maximum of about €25,000 [of material in a combustion engine truck].”
“How much battery do you get for €25,000? Even if [battery costs fall to] €60 per kilowatt hour, and I need 400 kilowatt hours, then I need €24,000 alone for the battery cells [in a single truck]”.