Autonomous technology developer Aurora Innovation, Inc. announced it has opened a specific lane for driverless commercial vehicles in Texas, supported by two terminals located on either side of the route. Aurora is touting this new autonomous truck lane as an industry first as it prepares for a commercial launch next year.
Aurora Innovation, Inc. ($AUR) is a developer of autonomous commercial vehicles and adjacent technologies that continues to evolve in its quest to reach commercial operations. Its technology has shown a lot of promise to date, garnering the attention (and checkbooks) of multiple automakers, including Toyota, Peterbilt, and Uber Freight.
In 2019, Aurora acquired LiDAR company Blackmore, enabling it to begin developing a sensing suite finally capable of safely operating large trucks autonomously at high speeds and through inclement weather conditions.
Since 2020, the company has been deploying Class 8 trucks integrated with its own Aurora Driver technology utilizing said proprietary LiDAR. This led to a reunion with former partner Volvo, which has since integrated Aurora Driver into its own trucks.
Last we spoke of Aurora, it was continuing its work toward the launch of self-driving trucks as a service (TaaS) called “Aurora Horizon” in 2024, following a massive round of funding to the tune of $820 million.
As it prepares to begin sending autonomous trucks out between its two new terminals in Texas, it has opened up a driverless-specific lane for them to safely navigate.
Aurora’s new Houston terminal / Credit: Aurora Innovation, Inc.
Aurora stays in its own lane… for autonomous trucks
According to details from the company, it has officially opened the autonomous commercial vehicle industry’s first driverless truck lane across I-45 between Dallas and Houston. Aurora currently has commercial-ready terminals in place in those two cities to support the trucks as they navigate back and forth.
Per Aurora, nearly half of all truck freight in the state of Texas moves along I-45, where the new driverless lane has been implemented, so it sees the corridor as an ideal route for its commercial launch of autonomous operations. Per Aurora co-founder and chief product officer Sterling Anderson:
Opening a driverless trucking lane flanked by commercially-ready terminals is an industry-first that unlocks our ability to launch our driverless trucking product. With this corridor’s launch, we’ve defined, refined, and validated the framework for the expansion of our network with the largest partner ecosystem in the autonomous trucking industry.
The terminals Anderson references are already being used by Aurora to store, maintain, prepare, inspect, and deploy autonomous trucks between destinations. The company shared that it has developed a specific terminal blueprint to implement a myriad of features to make each terminal commercial-ready when driverless truck services officially begin.
By designing and implementing these commercial-ready terminals, Aurora says it already has the capabilities to support driverless trucks 24/7, 365 days a year. These two initial terminals are already operating day and night, supporting trucks that haul over 75 loads per week for nearby pilot customers.
In addition to the terminals and new autonomous truck lane, Aurora shared that it is working to implement a new Command Center to further support its around-the-clock operations. Per the release:
Aurora’s Command Center includes a team of remote specialists who monitor and provide guidance to the active fleet of Aurora-powered trucks, and dispatchers who allocate trucks, trailers, and vehicle operators to missions. Aurora’s Command Center already supports commercial pilot hauls and is prepared to support driverless missions.
With more and more commercial infrastructure being put into place, Aurora appears poised to reach its target of commercial truck services in late 2024. This will be an operation to keep an eye on. For now, here’s a video Aurora recently provided showcasing its new autonomous truck lane and terminals in Texas.
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Today was the official start of racing at the Electrek Formula Sun Grand Prix 2025! There was a tremendous energy (and heat) on the ground at NCM Motorsports Park as nearly a dozen teams took to the track. Currently, as of writing, Stanford is ranked #1 in the SOV (Single-Occupant Vehicle) class with 68 registered laps. However, the fastest lap so far belongs to UC Berkeley, which clocked a 4:45 on the 3.15-mile track. That’s an average speed of just under 40 mph on nothing but solar energy. Not bad!
In the MOV (Multi-Occupant Vehicle) class, Polytechnique Montréal is narrowly ahead of Appalachian State by just 4 laps. At last year’s formula sun race, Polytechnique Montréal took first place overall in this class, and the team hopes to repeat that success. It’s still too early for prediction though, and anything can happen between now and the final day of racing on Saturday.
Congrats to the teams that made it on track today. We look forward to seeing even more out there tomorrow. In the meantime, here are some shots from today via the event’s wonderful photographer Cora Kennedy.
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The numbers are in and they are all bad for Tesla fans – the company sold just 5,000 Cybertruck models in Q4 of 2025, and built some 30% more “other” vehicles than it delivered. It just gets worse and worse, on today’s tension-building episode of Quick Charge!
We’ve also got day 1 coverage of the 2025 Electrek Formula Sun Grand Prix, reports that the Tesla Optimus program is in chaos after its chief engineer jumps ship, and a look ahead at the fresh new Hyundai IONIQ 2 set to bow early next year, thanks to some battery specs from the Kia EV2.
New episodes of Quick Charge are recorded, usually, Monday through Thursday (and sometimes Sunday). We’ll be posting bonus audio content from time to time as well, so be sure to follow and subscribe so you don’t miss a minute of Electrek’s high-voltage daily news.
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Tesla has launched its new Oasis Supercharger, the long-promised EV charging station of the future, with a solar farm and off-grid batteries.
Early in the deployment of the Supercharger network, Tesla promised to add solar arrays and batteries to the Supercharger stations, and CEO Elon Musk even said that most stations would be able to operate off-grid.
While Tesla did add solar and batteries to a few stations, the vast majority of them don’t have their own power system or have only minimal solar canopies.
Back in 2016, I asked Musk about this, and he said that it would now happen as Tesla had the “pieces now in place” with Supercharger V3, Powerpack V2, and SolarCity:
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All of these pieces have been in place for years, and Tesla has now discontinued the Powerpack in favor of the Megapack. The Supercharger network is also transitioning to V4 stations.
Yet, solar and battery deployment haven’t accelerated much in the decade since Musk made that comment, but it is finally happening.
Tesla has now unveiled the project and turned on most of the Supercharger stalls:
The project consists of 168 chargers, with half of them currently operational, making it one of the largest Supercharger stations in the world. However, that’s not even the most notable aspect of it.
The station is equipped with 11 MW of ground-mounted solar panels and canopies, spanning 30 acres of land, and 10 Tesla Megapacks with a total energy storage capacity of 39 MWh.
It can be operated off-grid, which is the case right now, according to Tesla.
With off-grid operations, Tesla was about to bring 84 stalls online just in time for the Fourth of July travel weekend. The rest of the stalls and a lounge are going to open later this year.
Electrek’s Take
This is awesome. A bit late, but awesome. This is what charging stations should be like: fully powered by renewable energy.
Unfortunately, it will be much harder to open those stations in the future due to legislation that Trump and the Republican Party have just passed, which removes incentives for solar and energy storage, adds taxes on them, and removes incentives to build batteries – all things that have helped Tesla considerably over the last few years.
The US is likely going to have a few tough years for EV adoption and renewable energy deployment.
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