Australia's heaviest trucks go electric with zero-emission freight depot   


November 1 2025
ABC News



In short:
Australia's transport sector is on track to become the highest-emitting industry by 2030, with heavy trucks a major contributor.

New Energy Transport's Wilton trial demonstrates that electric freight can be faster, cheaper, and cleaner than diesel.

What's next?
It hopes to have a depot with 50 trucks running by mid-2026.


Transport is shaping up as one of Australia's biggest carbon challenges, and one of the hardest to solve.

Already the nation's third-largest source of greenhouse emissions, it is on track to become the highest-emitting sector by 2030 as electricity generation continues to clean up.

Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water 2023 projections show transport emissions will continue to rise slightly to 2030 while other sectors are expected to decline.

Within that, heavy road freight looms large.

"Australia is an extremely road freight-dependent country," said Daniel Bleakley, co-chief executive and co-founder of New Energy Transport.

"We're the second-most road-freight-dependent country in the world after the United States, and we also have the heaviest trucks in the world.

Two men standing in front of a truck
Daniel Bleakley and Fredrik Pehrsson are co-founders of New Energy Transport.

"If we can decarbonise heavy freight, we can make a huge impact on reducing transport emissions overall."
New Energy Transport plans to establish a pilot fleet of heavy electric trucks in Wilton, south-west of Sydney, by the middle of 2026.

The company says it will be Australia's largest electric trucking depot.

The site will initially house up to 50 heavy electric prime movers, with plans to grow the fleet to 200 vehicles by 2031.

Wilton hub
The depot will be set up alongside Australia's busiest freight route — the Hume Highway.

Man in cabin and man standing on side of truck
A driver inspects a truck before the trial.

"It's a fantastic location because we've got good access to the Hume Highway and down to the Illawarra," Mr Bleakley said.

"There are around 5,000 trucks going up and down Picton Road to the Illawarra every day, and about 3,800 heavy trucks on the Hume Highway.

"We're positioning ourselves right in the middle of this extremely dense freight corridor."
The depot will be powered by a mix of grid electricity and on-site solar, about 3 to 5 megawatts, with high-powered chargers capable of fully recharging the 600 to 700 kilowatt-hour truck batteries in under an hour.

"If we can run these electric trucks on low-cost renewable energy, we can reduce both emissions and the cost of heavy road freight," Mr Bleakley said.

Electric trucks 'light years ahead'   
The concept was put to the test recently in what New Energy Transport believed was the longest single-charge electric truck delivery ever completed in Australia.

Truck on road
Wilton has been chosen as the site for Australia's largest heavy electric trucking depot. (Supplied: New Energy Transport)

Partnering with Multiquip, a major poultry transport and logistics company based in Liverpool, the team ran a 36-tonne electric prime mover from Picton to Beresfield in the Hunter and back again, about 480 kilometres on a single charge.

Multiquip national compliance manager David Muir, whose company supplied the chicken, said the test was a revelation.

"I was sceptical at the start. I still love proper diesel trucks," he said.

"But this thing was light-years ahead.   

"It was significantly faster uphill, kept up with traffic easily, and the torque delivery was immediate. Each direction we saved about 20 minutes compared to our diesel trucks."
Multiquip, which operates a fleet of about 500 trucks nationwide, found the electric truck not only matched diesel for range and cost, but offered surprising advantages.

"It was extremely quiet, [and] the driver said it was just so easy to drive," Mr Muir said.

"Less noise, less vibration, no exhaust fumes, it's a far better environment for drivers.   

"They were able to arrive at their destination still feeling pretty fresh."

He said the trial showed that for hub-to-hub freight within a few hundred kilometres, electric trucks could already compete.

"The electricity it used compared to diesel was a fraction," Mr Muir said.

Truck on the road
The company says the truck completed a 480-kilometre return trip between Picton and Beresfield on a single charge. (Supplied: New Energy Transport )

"It's early days, and infrastructure is the big challenge, but what we've seen so far is very promising."

Mr Bleakley believed those challenges were surmountable and that regional Australia could be at the forefront of powering a zero-emission freight future.

"If we transition the entire truck fleet to electric, we'll need about 20 per cent more electricity nationally," he said.

"But unlike diesel, that energy can be produced locally from renewables.

"That means we can make our freight network more resilient, cut costs, and keep food and goods moving even if global fuel supplies are disrupted."

So electric trucks weigh more. Does that mean -

1. Reduced freight so axle loads remain the same, or

2. Increased loads and more road damage?

Battery trucks will never be as good as diesel trucks.

What if the battery goes flat on a motorway?
With diesel you can refill it in a few minutes but a battery would take
24 hours to charge up.

Electric trucks will use most of their energy simply hauling their batteries around, with cargo capacity significantly reduced.

Dnarever wrote on Nov 2^nd, 2025 at 10:00pm:


Governments rarely make sense.


Dnarever wrote on Nov 2^nd, 2025 at 10:00pm:


Why would that make sense? Long haul traffic, by design, is for cross boundary state border traffic.