CranePower, a New Zealand start-up founded by engineer and entrepreneur Elliot Peacocke, has launched a compact battery-based mobile power system aimed at reducing the construction industry’s reliance on diesel generators.
The product, called the E-Gen, is designed to tackle rising fuel costs and improve efficiency on construction sites. Early deployments across New Zealand and Australia have shown operational fuel cost reductions of up to 85 per cent.
“Construction has been running on diesel generators for decades, but it’s an incredibly inefficient system. You’re burning fuel all day to service short bursts of demand,” said Elliot. “In today’s market, that’s wasteful, expensive, and unpredictable.”
The system replaces traditional diesel reliance with a battery-based approach that matches power supply to actual site demand. This helps reduce downtime and removes the need for refuelling logistics.
“Fuel is one of the biggest uncontrolled costs on a construction site. It’s driven by global events, not by the operator. What we’ve done is remove that dependency and replace it with something far more stable and efficient,” Elliot said.
“We’re matching power supply to how sites actually operate. Once you do that, the waste disappears, along with the costs.”
At the core of the E-Gen is CranePower’s Adaptive Power Platform, which manages generator, mains and stored battery energy in real time. The system can detect and respond to load spikes within milliseconds, allowing sites to use smaller generators or connect directly to a three-phase outlet without a transformer.
This is a shift from traditional diesel generators, which often run below optimal load to prepare for peak demand, such as tower crane lifts. The E-Gen instead smooths energy use throughout the day, improving efficiency and reducing the risk of downtime caused by generator issues or fuel shortages.
The unit is designed to be highly compact, with a footprint around 10 per cent of a traditional containerised battery energy storage system. It can be delivered by a standard pickup truck and installed quickly on space-constrained sites. For larger projects, up to eight units can be connected in parallel.
Each unit also includes 4G-enabled remote monitoring, giving users access to real-time data such as power usage, battery charge and ambient temperature.
CranePower said the system can help reduce both operating costs and carbon emissions by eliminating diesel use at the source. The data platform also allows companies to track energy use, calculate fuel savings and measure avoided emissions.
“The E-Gen system is an efficiency multiplier,” said Elliot. “It saves time, space, and day-to-day operational costs. Even before factoring in reduced maintenance over its 15-year lifespan, the fuel savings alone are enough to recoup the purchase cost in its initial 20 months of use. Aligning this operational efficiency with its immediate reduction of construction emissions and embodied carbon makes it a powerful tool for a sector facing both new challenges and rapid growth.”
CranePower was founded by Elliot, who previously owned a diesel generator business and identified inefficiencies in how generators were used, particularly for tower cranes.
“Conceptually, the E-Gen is a simple product,” he said. “The most surprising thing is that someone hasn’t done it yet — because the evolution to a much more efficient system just seems inevitable.”
