Aegis starts construction of 400kW vehicle charging hub

In Brief

Aegis Energy has started construction of its first commercial vehicle energy hub at Smithywood Business Park, near the M1 in Sheffield.

The company says the development will be the UK’s first clean, multi-energy hub designed specifically for commercial vehicles.

The site will provide 72 van bays and 30 truck bays, with CCS2 charging at up to 400kW alongside hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) refuelling.

The hub is scheduled to open in spring 2027 and will also provide overnight parking and driver welfare facilities.

In Review

Aegis Energy has started construction of its first commercial vehicle energy hub in Sheffield, which the company says will be the UK’s first clean, multi-energy hub designed specifically for commercial vehicles.

The development at Smithywood Business Park is scheduled to open in spring 2027, and will eventually feature 72 van bays and 30 truck bays, with CCS2 charging at up to 400kW available alongside HVO refuelling.

While some will question why the site isn’t immediately MCS-ready, given its focus on commercial vehicles, Aegis states that the charging hub is being developed with the provision for MCS as higher-power charging for electric HGVs develops. In layman terms, the technology isn’t fully established yet, so the firm would rather wait and implement it at a later date, but with the infrastructure already in place from the outset.

The exact size of the electrical capacity hasn’t been disclosed by Aegis, but it does note that it has been specified specifically to support high-powered commercial vehicle charging. In fact, the firm says all five of its hubs already have a grid connection secured to meet its ambitions.

But while Aegis is calling this the ‘UK’s first clean, multi-energy hub designed specifically for commercial vehicles’, which is quite a mouthful, it’s not exactly the first site designed for commercial vehicle charging. In fact, in March, Fleete opened a 5MW commercial EV charging hub at the Port of Tilbury, capable of charging up to 16 electric HGVs simultaneously. Voltempo also deployed an MCS-ready system at East Midlands Gateway in January that it says can deliver up to 1MW.

Michael Shaw, CEO of Aegis Energy, noted, “Decarbonising commercial transport starts with building the right infrastructure in the right places, and Sheffield is exactly that kind of location. As our first hub moves into construction, we are taking an important step in building a national network that gives fleet operators the practical, reliable infrastructure they need to transition.”

Sheffield is the first of five Aegis hubs currently under development, alongside Dartford, Warrington, Immingham and Corby. The Sheffield site is due to open in spring 2027.