Electric diggers, hydrogen and the future of plant hire

Electric machines, charging infrastructure, smarter safety systems, telematics and autonomy are changing the way construction equipment is bought, hired and operated. Hugh Edeleanu, Chairman and Founder of H.E. Services Plant Hire, and Andy Byatt, Head of Innovation and Sustainability at Flannery Plant Hire, discuss what is working in practice, where the challenges remain and what these developments mean for the future of plant hire.

In a recent podcast discussion hosted by Ollie Gunns of Gunns Contractors, the pair covered everything from electric excavators and hydrogen to human form recognition, telematics and autonomous machines.

When someone who has spent more than half a century in plant hire sits down with someone responsible for innovation and sustainability across a fleet of thousands of machines, there is plenty to talk about.

Hugh Edeleanu, Chairman and Founder of H.E. Services Plant Hire, started the business 54 years ago. Andy Byatt, Head of Innovation and Sustainability at Flannery Plant Hire, works across new machine technology, lower-carbon equipment, telematics, and the company’s carbon reduction plans.

Joining UK Plant Operators’ Ollie Gunns of Gunns Contractors ahead of UK Plant Expo 2027, the pair covered everything from electric excavators and hydrogen to human form recognition, telematics, and autonomous machines.

One theme quickly became clear. The transition to lower-carbon plant is no longer just a discussion about what might happen in the future. Equipment is already working, data is being collected, and hirers are learning where the technology makes commercial sense.

For Flannery, one of the first opportunities does not involve buying another machine at all.

Byatt said data from thousands of assets on the fleet shows that machines can spend more than 40 per cent of their time idling during the summer months, rising towards 50 per cent during winter.

Reducing that figure can deliver immediate savings in fuel, emissions and operating costs.

Flannery uses the information alongside its NOCN-accredited Eco Operator training programme, covering areas including excessive idling, correct operating modes, site set-up and tyre pressures.

It is a reminder that the route to lower emissions does not necessarily begin with replacing every diesel machine.

Hybrid technology is another part of the picture. Flannery operates Komatsu hybrid excavators in the 20 and 36-tonne classes, with Byatt reporting fuel savings of more than 20 per cent in the right applications.

The words “right application” matter.

A hybrid excavator working on bulk loading or trenching can recover energy through frequent slewing. Put the same machine into an application where it barely rotates and the calculation changes.

It is much the same story with battery-electric plant.

H.E. Services runs electric excavators, telehandlers, dumpers and other equipment, but Edeleanu said customer demand and machine application remain crucial.

Small dumpers are one example where he sees a particularly strong case for electric power. On many building sites a one or three-tonne dumper may move material, sit while it is loaded and then move again. Unlike a diesel machine left ticking over, an electric machine consumes virtually nothing while it waits.

Telehandlers can offer a similar opportunity.

“A lot of telehandlers might only do two hours a day,” Edeleanu explained. “A lorry turns up, they unload the lorry, then it sits in the compound waiting for something else.”

For that duty cycle, a huge battery may simply not be necessary.

At the heavier end of the market, battery technology is also moving more quickly than many in the industry might once have expected.

Byatt pointed to machines now moving well beyond the compact classes. Flannery’s experience with 20-tonne electric excavators has seen them achieve at least six hours of continuous operation in particularly energy-intensive applications and, in the vast majority of applications, around eight-and-a-half to ten hours on a single charge.

That is continuous working time rather than the engine hours recorded by a diesel machine that may spend a substantial part of the day idling.

The machine is only half the answer

Both hirers returned repeatedly to infrastructure.

An electric machine can be perfectly capable of doing the job, but that becomes irrelevant if there is nowhere practical to charge it.

Edeleanu believes solar generation and battery storage could become part of the answer, particularly on larger projects lasting a year or more. A combination of grid power, solar and stored energy can also help where the available grid connection is not large enough to meet the entire site’s demand.

Flannery has taken that thinking further through Site Charge, its joint venture with Vital Power Group, providing fixed and mobile charging and battery storage solutions alongside electric plant.

For Byatt, energy planning needs to start much earlier than the point at which a machine arrives on site.

Get involved during pre-construction and tendering, he argued, and contractors can plan charging, battery storage and available energy supply together. That can reduce reliance on generators, make use of cheaper off-peak electricity and allow stored energy to power far more than the machines themselves, including welfare units, accommodation, tools and electric vehicles.

Hydrogen inevitably entered the conversation too.

Byatt believes it could still have a role in applications where electrification is particularly difficult but said there are significant hurdles to overcome before hydrogen-powered plant becomes widespread.

Green hydrogen remains limited in availability across parts of the UK and can be expensive unless a project is using it at sufficient scale. Storage, transportation and the infrastructure needed on site also add another layer of complexity.

Flannery has already gained experience through trials of hydrogen technology, including the government-funded Element 1 project, involving excavators running on a mixture of diesel or HVO and hydrogen.

Byatt said battery electric currently has the stronger momentum, particularly as battery capacity, charging speeds and the range of available machines continue to improve.

“I do think there will be a place for hydrogen in areas where it is really difficult to electrify,” he said. “But I most definitely don’t think it’s the lead.”

For now, battery electric appears to be moving ahead more quickly.

Technology is also changing what happens around the machine.

Human form recognition, 360-degree cameras, height and slew restriction and digital thumbs-up systems are increasingly familiar on major projects.

There was agreement, though, that technology needs to help the operator rather than overwhelm them.

Edeleanu remains a strong believer in starting with a good machine and a properly trained operator. Cameras, he argued, can offer a significant safety improvement without necessarily adding the complexity and cost of some higher-end systems.

Byatt acknowledged the risk of repeated warnings becoming “white noise” for an operator.

For Flannery, the value increasingly lies in what happens to the information afterwards.

Human form recognition systems can record incursions around machines, allowing the data to be analysed by site, machine or project. Rather than looking at thousands of individual alarms, the aim is to identify patterns, understand why incursions are occurring and decide what action is needed.

That could lead to additional training, changes in segregation or improvements to the way a site is laid out.

It is part of a much bigger change in telematics.

Tracking where a machine is located is now only the starting point. Hirers and contractors can monitor fuel consumption, utilisation, idling, machine health, servicing requirements and carbon output.

With electric equipment, battery state and energy consumption join the list.

Flannery’s partnership with Hiboo now brings more than 30 telematics data feeds into one platform, giving customers a common view across different machine brands.

H.E. Services takes a slightly different approach, generally using manufacturers’ own systems and Trackunit where a machine does not have a proprietary platform.

Different fleets, different customers and different solutions, but both businesses see machine data as increasingly important.

The next step could be removing the operator from some repetitive tasks altogether.

Flannery has secured government funding alongside Gravis Robotics for a two-year programme trialling retrofit autonomous technology on excavators across UK customer sites, working in conjunction with JCB.

The focus is not on dropping an autonomous excavator into the middle of a busy and unpredictable construction site.

Instead, the trials will concentrate on repetitive, segregated operations where automation has the greatest opportunity to work effectively, including trenching, bulk earthmoving and truck loading.

Byatt explains that semi-autonomous technology is already available, although adoption is not yet widespread. Excavator assist systems for digging and grading are examples of technology already in use. Full autonomy in construction is considerably harder to achieve than in quarrying or mining, where routes and tasks can be more consistent and repetitive, but the direction of travel is clear.

Edeleanu provides a useful counterpoint.

Much of the H.E. Services fleet works across a huge number of smaller sites, many of which may never need sophisticated machine control or autonomy. For those customers, a good machine and skilled operator remain the starting point.

And perhaps that is the most important point to come out of the discussion.

There will not be one technology that suddenly transforms every machine and every site.

Electric equipment will suit some applications before others. Hydrogen may find particular niches. Automation will move faster on predictable tasks. Advanced safety systems will continue to be driven strongly by major contractors, while telematics will quietly provide more of the information businesses need to reduce costs and use machines more effectively.

What matters is seeing what works.

That is one reason both Flannery Plant Hire and H.E. Services will be exhibiting at UK Plant Expo 2027.

Edeleanu remembers the old SED shows as places where you could walk around, discover something new and think: “That’s a great idea. I might buy that.”

Byatt expects new electric machines and possibly hydrogen-powered equipment to emerge over the coming months, alongside further developments in safety, telemetry and machine technology.

For operator Ollie Gunns, the attraction is even more straightforward: being able to get hands-on, climb into a machine and find out what it is actually like to use.

UK Plant Expo takes place at the Heart of England Events Centre, Warwickshire, on 11 and 12 June 2027, bringing together live machinery, working demonstrations, technology and the UK Plant Operator of the Year competition.

After more than an hour talking about where plant could be heading, perhaps the best conclusion is that there will be plenty to put to the test.

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