Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - C2C-NewCap (Towards a safe, reliable and cost competitive transport sector in Europe)

Teaser

\"While passenger vehicles are quite evolved in the use of electric or hybrid engines, in Heavy Commercial and Passenger Vehicles the internal combustion engine remains dominant along with the use of Lead Acid Batteries. The Heavy Transport Industry is subject to intense...

Summary

\"While passenger vehicles are quite evolved in the use of electric or hybrid engines, in Heavy Commercial and Passenger Vehicles the internal combustion engine remains dominant along with the use of Lead Acid Batteries. The Heavy Transport Industry is subject to intense pressure both from fierce competition and from increasing fuel costs and stringent regulations on air pollution, traffic management and carbon emissions. The pressure on batteries due to the high number of devices and many start stops induced by the need to reduce idling, leads to accelerated wear. In addition, batteries have the problem of losing performance in very cold environments. To avoid these risks, frequent replacement of the batteries is necessary, with consequent increases in maintenance costs. By using the C2C supercapacitor to replace one or more batteries, it eliminates \"\"no stars\"\" due to \"\"dead batteries”, prolongs the life of the remaining batteries and eliminates the need for frequent replacement.

Due to its fuel efficient and low carbon technology characteristics, coupled with the competitive price and ease of installation, the C2C supercapacitors will contribute to a faster adoption by the owners of the trucks and buses and in this way contribute to major Global and EU challenges such as the decarbonisation of economy and the global climate goals. In what concerns particularly the EU, C2C will promote mobility that is efficient, safe, secure and environmentally friendly, by helping with some of the major European transport challenges, such as:
• oil dependency – despite improvements in energy efficiency, transport still depends on oil for 96% of its energy needs. Oil will become scarcer in future, increasingly sourced from unstable parts of the world. By 2050, the price is projected to more than double compared to 2005.
• greenhouse gas emissions – by 2050, the EU must cut transport emissions by 60% compared with 1990 levels, if we are to limit global warming to an increase of just 2ºC.
• competition – the EU’s transport sector faces growing competition from fast-developing transport markets in other regions.

C2C-NewCap removes this “pressure” from batteries, expanding their life cycle, cutting fuel use, air pollution and carbon emissions (5%-15%). When compared to the other existing commercialised supercapacitors C2C is safe to operate, easier to install, environmental friendliness, reliable and price competitive.
Battery replacement (or retrofitting) is a common procedure that every truck goes through during its lifetime. Moreover, for trucks currently in circulation there are no other forms on the market that are economical, and simultaneously solve the problem of dead batteries, allowing trucks and buses to reduce their CO2 emission levels and save fuel. The C2C supercapacitor is a low carbon and fuel efficient technology, with a reduced payback time.

C2C will be the only water based asymmetric Nickel carbon supercapacitor in the market, and due to the production costs reduction achieved by C2C this product can be offered at a highly competitive price, making it the economically viable alternative that the market was looking for.
This technology holds a large range of applications within Transport (Heavy and Medium Truck engine starting, hybrid traction, regenerative engine braking …), Energy (Pitch control, utility grid stability, frequency and peak shaving..) and Industry (UPS, Industrial vehicles) sectors.
\"

Work performed

The main achievements of the SME phase 1 were the scale-up of the supercapacitor cells, plus improvements of the overall product and manufacturing processes, the participation in market fairs and the leverage of corporate VC willing to support our actions. With this program we had a better understanding of several aspects related with the project, namely: IPR issues, technical issues, more strategic approach for identifying risks and risk management and better understanding of the client needs.

Final results

The SME phase 1 program allowed us to make several technical improvements, namely we have scale-up our technology and start working with potential customers, corporate and VC investors to push our product to pilot testing and accelerate product launch. We will be able to capture skilled professionals and increase the head count in the company, and we have included start internal programs for internships of students. Other potential impact is the benefits that our product will bring to the society, including the higher efficient management of energy, improve efficiency of transportation and reduce dependency of oil and lower greenhouse emissions.

Website & more info

More info: http://www.c2cnewcap.com.