£29m low carbon vehicle project to be reviewed
CRITICAL developments in the viability of low carbon vehicles and the effectiveness of a major research initiative will be debated today at an event hosted by the University of Warwick.
The Low Carbon Vehicle Technology Project, launched in 2009, has been a collaboration between leading automotive companies and research partners, such as WMG and Jaguar Land Rover. It has been revolutionising the way vehicles are powered and manufactured.
The £29m project, which has also involved Coventry University, Tata Motors, Ricardo, MIRA and Zytek Automotive, has focused on the ability of research and development facilities to deliver low carbon vehicle technologies and meet socio-economic outputs.
It aimed to accelerate production of the first low carbon vehicles by four years, to safeguard more than 2,000 jobs in the region’s supply chain as businesses switch to low carbon opportunities and is seen as pivotal to the Government’s decision to declare the West Midlands a Low Carbon Economic Area for advanced automotive engineering.
The project comprised 15 separate technical R&D workstreams, each of which was led by a partner who worked closely with selected SMEs to develop solutions spanning: Battery Cells & Packs, Drive Motors, Power Electronics, High Voltage Electrical Distribution, Auxiliary Power Units, Vehicle Supervisory Control, Lightweight Structures, Vehicle Dynamics & Traction Control, High Efficiency Heating Ventilation & Air Conditioning (HVAC) and System Cooling, Reduction of Parasitic Losses, Waste Energy & Energy Storage, Aerodynamic Performance, Human Machine Interface (HMI) Engineering, Large Saloon Vehicle and Optimised Electric Vehicle Package.
The multi-million pound project was funded by regional development agency Advantage West Midlands, the European Regional Development Fund and contributions from industry partners.
