Hyundai patent suggests the company is moving wireless EV charging roads to the next level

Dynamic wireless charging may be edging closer to reality

News By Leon Poultney published 23 September 2024

A recent patent filed by Hyundai to the United States Patent and Trademark Office appears to show that the brand is working on technology that could help electric vehicles charge as they drive.

Often referred to as wireless dynamic charging, the technology uses a specially designed charging plate located underneath the vehicle to draw charge from electromagnetic coils mounted beneath the road surface.

There are a number of dynamic charging projects currently underway, including a stretch of 14th Street in Detroit, Michigan, as well as pilot programmes in Japan and Norway.

On top of the huge cost involved, one of the other issues this technology faces is maintaining a perfectly smooth and pothole-free road surface to ensure the correct distances between the wireless charging receiver on the car and the coils installed beneath the road.

According to CarBuzz, Hyundai’s patent looks to be addressing this very problem, as it includes a "height-adjustable inductive power transfer coupler" that can raise and lower itself on the move to ensure the perfect distance between car and road surface, resulting in a charging experience that is free form interruption.

The second part of the patent borrows learnings from the likes of Mercedes-Benz and Rolls-Royce, which both use high-definition camera technology to read the road surface ahead and make minute adjustments to the suspension settings in order to maintain the perfect ride quality.

But rather than adjust the adaptive suspension, Hyundai’s idea is to have data from this live camera feed influence the height of the wireless charging induction pad mounted beneath the vehicle in question.

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