Solar Team 6/10/2016

Fig. 1) Energy Consumption of Vehicles



 Figure one shows the equation and calculations used to estimate the energy consumed of the vehicles in the superway. It is important to note that this equations takes into account that all the vehicles will be connected in the form of a train, meaning that the wind resistance and drag is not accounted for in every vehicle as it will be in reality. Figure 6 is the edited equation with wind and drag being accounted for in every vehicle.

Fig. 2 SAMS required conditions for annual energy consumption

                                            Fig. 3) SAMS Data of annual energy

Figure two shows the conditions required for our calculated annual energy consumption of 150 Vehicles. The conditions were calculated with a 340W Miasole thin Solar panel, and Exeltech  XLGT18A60 Inverter (120V AC). With an estimated requirement of 6 Million kWh annually SAMS determines we will need approximately 12,500 panels with a total area of 32,189 m^2.

                             Fig. 4) Comparison in Wh/mile with Superway Pod and GM EV1 for 24 miles

Figure 4 is the comparison in Wh/mile. GM EV1 approximated at 50mph and 24 miles that their electric vehicle with use 127watt-hours/mile. When we estimate one Superway pod traveling at 25mph at a distance of 24 miles we calculate 132.5 watt-hours/mile. This comparison allows us to validate that we are in the "ball park" of watt-hours/mile also giving our equation in figure one more credibility.

                Fig. 5) Comparison in Wh/mile with Superway Pod and GM EV1 for 3500meters (2.17miles)

Figure 5 is the comparison in Wh/mile when we are considering the real distance between stops, which is 3500meters instead of 24 miles. We are considering a 20 meters elevation drop and rise before and after the distance in between stops.  Taking into account the abundant acceleration and deceleration (because of the shorter distance in between stops) we calculate a total of 2114 Watt-hours/mile per vehicle. This emphasize the loss of energy form accelerations, deceleration and elevations in our track.

Fig. 6) Consumption of energy per vehicle taking into account wind resistance and drag for each vehicle.

Figure 6 is our estimations of how much energy would be consumed by our vehicles when we look at them as an individual pods instead of a one large train of pods. This of course adds more consumed energy by our vehicles, approximately increased by  1.62*10^5 J per 150 cars annually. SAMS estimates that we would need to add 3,000-4,000 solar panels to account for the extra wind resistance for each vehicle.

     Fig. 7) Energy leftover each day actuator consumption and optimization.

Figure 7 shows the energy leftover each day when was consume energy from the actuators and add optimization from the actuators. The estimation is done assuming the exact panels required to meet the energy consumption by our vehicles (accounting for air resistance) per day. As shown having actuators change twice a year or 4 times a year adds a significant energy production (leftover) per day. The 2-axis tracker does add more efficiency than the fixed panels however considering the energy consumed throughout the day from its tracker and actuator is actually will produce less leftover joules per day than the 2 season and 4 season actuator. The next step for this will to be estimate the costs of the actuators and trackers and determine if the cost is worth the leftover joules per day.