Ohio State accepted into EcoCAR 2: Plugging in to the Future

With EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge concluding at the end of this academic year, September 2011 will mark the beginning of another three-year collegiate engineering competition sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy and General Motors. EcoCAR 2: Plugging in to the Future will build on a successful 23-year history of the DOE’s Advanced Vehicle Technology Competitions.

The 16 teams accepted into EcoCAR 2: Plugging in to the Future were announced today at the SAE Congress in Detroit, by the Department of Energy’s David Sandalow, Assistant Secretary for Policy and International Affairs.

Similar to EcoCAR: The NeXT Challenge, the EcoCAR 2: Plugging in to the Future competition will require students to explore different powertrain architectures for a smaller vehicle. Teams will utilize a Chevrolet Malibu, donated by General Motors, to reduce its environmental impact without compromising performance, safety and consumer acceptability.

During the three-year program, GM will provide production vehicles, vehicle components, seed money, technical mentoring and operational support. The DOE and its research and development facility, Argonne National Laboratory, will provide competition management, team evaluation and technical and logistical support. Through sponsoring such advanced vehicle engineering competitions, GM and the DOE are helping to develop the next generation of scientists and engineers.

With one of the highest scoring proposals, the Ohio StateEcoCAR 2 Teamis looking forward to being a competitive team.


Additional information about EcoCAR 2 is available on the Web at www.ecocar2.org and on our blog at www.green-garage.org.



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