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HYDROGEN TO FUEL VEHICLES IN PENN STATE DEMO

University Park—A Penn State van and a Centre Area Transportation Authority (CATA) bus will run on a blend of hydrogen and compressed natural gas (CNG) by late fall 2004 as part of a broad research initiative to be managed by Penn State’s Pennsylvania Transportation Institute (PTI).

PTI will also fuel one of its own electric vehicles with pure hydrogen after installing a fuel cell to convert the hydrogen to electricity.

PTI and its partners received $243,828 for the vehicle modifications from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Feb. 10, complementing a similar amount awarded in January by the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development.

In the project, Collier Technologies of Nevada will modify the engines of the bus and van to run on a blend of 30 to 50 percent hydrogen and CNG. CATA will then operate the bus in the campus loop service, and Penn State’s Office of Physical Plant (OPP) will use the van. PTI Research Associate Joel Anstrom and Penn State students will install the hydrogen fuel cell into one of the electric vehicles already used for research and education in the PTI shops. They will operate the vehicle on campus.

PTI will also coordinate the training of CATA and OPP drivers and maintenance people to operate and work on the bus and van, Dr. Anstrom noted. A team headed by PTI Research Associate Zoltan Rado will collect extensive data on the operational and environmental performance of the vehicles.

PTI hopes to secure more money to modify and monitor other vehicles in a second and third year of the project, Dr. Rado added.

Already secured is the approximately $3 million needed for a hydrogen-CNG and pure hydrogen fueling station at OPP on campus. In an agreement among Penn State, the U.S. Department of Energy, and Air Products and Chemicals, Inc., Air Products will develop and build and Penn State will operate the station. Plans call for a hydrogen-CNG dispenser and a pure hydrogen dispenser to be in operation by late fall 2004.

A final part of the research initiative will be to secure participation of vehicle manufacturers in the fueling station demonstration, Dr. Rado said.

Equipment already is available for fueling vehicles with CNG. Hydrogen can be produced from CNG and supplement it as a fuel for current engines modified to run on the blend.

The Penn State station and the hydrogen-CNG blend for modified internal combustion engines may serve as a step toward a fueling station infrastructure for the vehicles of the future designed to run on pure hydrogen.

Research continues on hydrogen fuel cells that will power cars containing electric motors. In such vehicles, a fuel cell takes pure hydrogen stored on board, mixes it with air, and converts it to electricity for the motor and water as a by-product.

PENN STATE'S HYBRID ELECTRIC SUV FINISHES AMONG LEADERS AT FUTURETRUCK 2003

University Park—Penn State's Wattmuncher, a 2002 Ford Explorer re-engineered into a hybrid electric vehicle by student volunteers, won the Built Ford Tough Award and finished fifth overall in the 15-university FutureTruck 2003 competition.

Dr. Daniel C. Haworth, associate professor of mechanical engineering and the students' faculty advisor, noted, "The team received the award for entering the competition with a working and debugged vehicle, completing every event on the first try, and being the first team to complete several of the events."

While the team’s fifth place finish duplicated its achievement at last year’s competition, only 6 points of a possible 1,000 separated Penn State this year from third place holder Michigan Technological University. The University of Wisconsin, Madison, won the competition.

Penn State's point total moved up by 150 this year after the team made substantial adjustments to Wattmuncher, particularly in the area of exhaust emissions. In a major effort to reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides, the team reached the level for ultra low emissions vehicles, “quite an accomplishment for a diesel,” said Dr. Haworth. (A diesel engine and an electric motor power Wattmuncher. While a diesel contributes to fuel economy, it provides a challenge in the area of emissions.)

“Nitrogen oxides are among the worst vehicle emissions produced, and extremely difficult to control,” said team member Henry M. Chance. “We were able to resolve this issue using a production-feasible solution.”

The team also scored a perfect 100 points in the oral presentation on design, winning the event with a performance greatly improved over last year’s. A few team members began working on the presentation months before the competition, where they stood before a panel of judges and “detailed how and why the truck was put together,” said Henry.

The 15 universities, selected by proposal, competed in events that began June 2 at Ford's Michigan Proving Ground and concluded with an awards dinner June 12 in Dearborn, Michigan. The events involved trailer towing, fuel economy, acceleration, off-road performance, the oral presentation, and inspections for emissions, design, and consumer acceptability. Vehicles first had to pass a technical inspection and qualify on braking and handling courses.

The competition challenges student teams to re-engineer a stock Ford Explorer to achieve lower emissions levels and a 25 percent increase in fuel economy without sacrificing vehicle performance and consumer acceptability. All teams produced variations of a hybrid electric vehicle, in which an internal combustion engine, complemented by an electric motor and battery pack, provides the power.

The U.S. Department of Energy, Argonne National Laboratory, and Ford were headline sponsors for the 2002 and 2003 competitions, and will continue in 2004. A host of other corporations and governmental and non-profit organizations also back the competition, including Delphi Automotive Systems, which awarded Penn State third place in its Advanced Powertrain Technology Award ratings.

More than 40 volunteers, many of them members of the student chapter of the Society of Automotive Engineers, worked on the vehicle during the 2002-2003 academic year. Fourteen team members and Dr. Haworth attended the competition (see photo). Penn State and its Pennsylvania Transportation Institute (PTI), as well as corporations and organizations, supported the team.

PTI will continue to provide lab and shop space and administrative support in the 2003-2004 academic year as the team gears up for the 2004 FutureTruck competition. Undergraduate and graduate students who want to participate should look for an announcement about the time and location of the Monday evening team meetings that will begin in the fall semester, or contact Dr. Haworth.

Participation offers a practical educational experience that can also pay dividends at the competition as sponsors and potential employers meet team members. “I believe this is one of the best educational experiences that we have to offer engineering students at Penn State,” said Dr. Haworth. Furthermore, College of Engineering freshmen, who must take a first-year seminar, can choose one related to the hybrid electric vehicle project, he noted.

Background information on the competition can be found at www.futuretruck.org.

Call for Papers

ASME International
Sixth Annual Symposium on "Advanced Vehicle Technologies"
The International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition
November 14-19, 2004, Anaheim, CA, USA

The Vehicle Design Committee of the ASME Engineering Design Division is organizing a symposium entitled "Advanced Vehicle Technologies" to be held during The International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition on November 14-19, 2004, Anaheim, CA, USA. Papers are invited on innovative analytical, computational, and experimental investigations in control, dynamics, and design of full vehicle systems and their sub-assemblies. Papers may address fundamental research, applied research, or successful implementations relating to light or heavy vehicle design and development. Six sessions will be organized as follows:

Session 1: Advances in Methods for Vehicle Systems Design

Topics include optimal, reliable, and robust design of vehicles and their systems and subsystems, design of integrated (mechatronics) systems, and engineering applications referring to vehicle design.

Session 2: Advances in Vehicle Systems Product Development

Papers in the area of product development, as it applies to the automotive industry, are solicited. Topics include, but are not limited to, design target setting, business case analysis, reliability and maintenance issues, cost models, impact analysis of novel and advanced technologies, market uncertainty and demand modeling.

Session 3: Forensics and Safety Applications of Vehicle Design Tools

Many vehicle design tools such as finite element programs, lighting design programs, and driving simulators can also be used to determine what happened in failures and accidents and how the performance of the drivers and vehicles involved compare to norms. These design tools can also be used to design safety enhancements for both vehicles and roadways that reduce the probability of accidents. Topics will include determining vehicle speeds and orientations at impact, determining accelerations experienced in impacts, using finite elements to study the validity and accuracy of crush-based accident analysis, the design of seats that protect occupants in impacts, design of structures that protect occupants in impacts, visibility enhancement means, perception reaction studies (especially those that look at driver perception reactions in complex situations), automatic systems for reducing the probability of accidents (such as systems for detecting dangers of roll-overs and dangers of collisions with vehicles ahead), improved trailer hitches and other means for improving the stability of trailers, and general means for improving crashworthiness of vehicles.

Session 4: Advances in Vehicle Systems Modeling and Simulation

Topics will include analytical prediction techniques that enable a quicker time to market. Some example topics include tire mechanics and modeling using advanced techniques, including FEA and Artificial Neural Networks applications to vehicle modeling, visualization techniques, and virtual prototyping using advanced techniques.

Session 5: Advances in Vehicle Systems Dynamics and Control

Papers in the general area of Dynamics and Controls applications to vehicle systems are welcome. Topics include integrated design of the tire-suspension system of race cars, modeling, analysis, and experimental testing of ABS systems with load shifting, an optimum design approach using active and semi-active suspension for 3-D vehicle models, rollover intelligent rollover warning systems, and active yaw control systems for road and off-road vehicles.

Session 6: Advances in Vehicle Systems Testing

Topics include new equipment and new methodologies developed for testing vehicles and vehicle systems, such as suspension, propulsion, tires, etc. Papers describing testing protocols, data collection, analysis, and interpretation, as well as applications of test results in design of vehicle systems are welcome.

Interested authors from academic and government institutions and the automotive industry are requested to submit abstracts of up-to 500 words by January 31, 2004. Note that abstracts (and papers) will be submitted online through the ASME Web Site. The sessions' chairs will notify the authors of the acceptance of their abstracts by February 9, 2004. Full papers to be submitted for review are due by March 29, 2004. Reviews will be available on July 26, 2004, and final manuscripts will be due on August 30, 2004.

All papers will be subjected to extensive review and the best paper will be selected; the authors of the best paper will receive the Best Paper Award at the opening of the 6th Advanced Vehicle Technologies Symposium at the ASME Congress in November 14-19, 2004, Anaheim, CA