Making electric vehicles safer and more efficient

Light urban vehicles are a category of vehicles that are simpler and smaller than most cars, and are a perfect candidate for clean, electric urban mobility. However, regulations for such vehicles don't require crash testing and are therefore often less safe than "real" cars.

In order to encourage the electrification of road transport via alternative powertrain vehicles such as EVs the European Commission Research and Innovation Directorate General has launched several projects to demonstrate that such small vehicles can also reach a sufficient safety level while remaining more energy efficient than cars in the urban environment that produce noxious emissions and greenhouse gases.

To address the issue, the 'Building blocks concepts for efficient and safe multiuse urban electrical vehicles' (WIDE-MOB) project considered the overall design and development components of Evs that can be broadly used. Overall, the aim was to make electrical urban mobility safer and more efficient.

Project members created several novel concepts to tackle safety as well as the reduction of energy consumption, use of raw materials and emissions. These include optimised aerodynamic bodies, lightweight and low-cost crashworthy architecture, overall system optimisation, smart solar panels, and modular and reconfigurable design.

WIDE-MOB partners developed a running demo vehicle for urban mobility by implementing all the concepts. Virtual and physical crash tests were carried out. Results showed that Evs under 600 kg are able to meet rigorous safety standards, achieve optimal performance and harvest energy via fitted smart solar panels.

Lastly, the team produced guidelines for concepts that can be extensively applied to the majority of EV and HEV architectures.

Given the importance of reducing carbon emissions and pollution from road transport and the price and security of oil supply, Evs will provide a viable alternative to traditional engines using fossil fuels. WIDE-MOB should ultimately help the EU to meet its targets for the rollout and uptake of clean and energy-efficient vehicles.