"The world market for electric vehicles should reach 10% of total industrial production by 2020" declared recently one of the major leaders in the automotive sector, convinced of the growth in this new market.
Already, most manufacturers are putting their imaginations to work to meet this challenge. The stakes are high as innovation is at the heart of this new challenge, a way for everyone to enrich their own "Technology DNA" via significant investments in research and development.
With no exhaust, the electric car is ecological and silent and perfectly adapted for the urban setting; it brings multiple solutions to the problems of large cities poorly adapted to increasing traffic.
It offers a modern and attractive technical solution particularly adapted to car-sharing or self-service cars, both formulas drawing young generations concerned with the development of tomorrow's car.
For this reason the electric car has very quickly interested the public authorities, both State and in municipalities, who have decided to generously support its production and facilitate its use. [www.formulec.org]
A New Technology Showcase
The "Formulec" single-seater racing series [www.formulec.org] and the EF01 foreshadow motor racing of tomorrow. Together, they will confirm the role of the major motor races as the technological showcase where research, performance and innovation are intimately related to reach excellence. It will allow the acceleration of research, improve the efficiency of solutions for electric-drive vehicles and, if necessary, adapt them for tomorrow's cars. Finally, the sporting and dramatic role of motor racing will be further reinforced by its technological dimension. More than ever, Formulec and the EF01 will contribute in their domain to making high-level motor racing a place to test new technologies boldly looking to the future.
Formula Student Electric
The principle of Formula Student Electric is to allow the development of fully electric vehicles within the Formula Student framework. The competition for Formula Student Electric cars is the same as for combustion cars, with some slight modifications due the special needs of fully electric vehicles.
NMMU Racing Green Technology
The core focus of NMMU Racing has always been to provide industry-relevant practical training opportunities for our engineering students. In addition, we have also realized the importance of exposing our young engineers to environmental issues, to highlight the larger impact that their designs have on the world around us. To further challenge ourselves, we have targeted two areas which have a direct impact on the environment, namely renewable energy and renewable materials.
The Launch of NMMU Racing’s Green Technology division brings these concepts together and will be the banner under which we develop our first plug-in electric formula student car. To achieve this ambitions goal we are aggressively recruiting electrical and mechatronic students to boost our technical capacity in these areas, so that in 2013, we can once again be the first university in Africa to compete in this formula.