Overview
- Honda R&D, Taisei Corporation and Taisei Rotec announced Monday that they have developed a road-embedded system that transfers power from transmitters in the pavement to receivers on moving vehicles.
- The partners put the inverter and coil together inside each road unit and feed them with direct-current wiring so the modules can be milled into existing pavement rather than requiring full road replacement.
- Private tests at Taisei’s Satte facility showed the pavement and embedded units can bear heavy commercial vehicles of about 20 tonnes, and a Tamura trial starting late 2026 will run one million wheel passes and measure electromagnetic-field leakage.
- Future technical targets include demonstrating reliable in‑motion charging at highway speeds and power delivery up to 150 kilowatts to serve large trucks, outcomes that will be checked in the Tamura trials and a Tateyama Expressway demonstration beginning in Japan’s 2027 fiscal year.
- Costs, long-term maintenance and large-scale economics remain unresolved, but the project is aimed first at logistics fleets and could enable smaller batteries and less downtime for commercial vehicles if durability, safety and price are proven; Toyota, Denso and Obayashi will run parallel trials in the Tateyama Project for comparison.