The U.S. government is looking to boost the energy efficiency of the armed forces, according to several initiatives announced by the White House last week. The initiatives include a new laboratory, the deployment of a convoy to advance STEM education, and a competition to develop energy-storage technologies for battlefield and civilian applications. In addition, the DoD is setting a goal to deploy 3 GW of renewable energy—including solar, wind, biomass, and geothermal—on Army, Navy, and Air Force installations by 2025.
On April 11, the Army opened a 30,000-square-foot lab to develop energy technologies for the next generation of combat vehicles. This new lab will support the launch of the Army Green Warrior Convoy, which will test and demonstrate advanced vehicle technology including fuel cells, hybrid systems, battery technologies, and alternative fuels.
The new laboratory initiative actually braces eight labs under the rubric Ground Systems Power and Energy Lab (GSPEL), which will address power, energy and mobility, technologies at a single facility. Located at the U.S. Army Tank Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center (TARDEC) at the Detroit Arsenal in Warren, MI, GSPEL will provide the Army’s ground vehicle experts with the ability to test vehicle systems and components under a variety of conditions. “The testing, knowledge, and technologies that will be developed right here at GSPEL will help reduce soldier risk and enhance overall vehicle performance,” said MG Kurt J. Stein, Commander of the TACOM Life Cycle Management Command. “In addition to improving fuel efficiency, this facility will be working hard to reduce fuel consumption, expand our use of renewable and alternative energy, ensure access to sufficient energy supplies, and minimize environmental impacts.”
Added Dr. Grace M. Bochenek, chief technology officer for the Army Materiel Command and former TARDEC director, “This GSPEL laboratory complex is less a new beginning and grand opening, and more a bold statement by our Nation’s Army about its role and duty in accelerating energy security. It’s a statement of commitment, of progress, and a vivid symbol of the way we do business in this ground-vehicle community.”
A centerpiece the laboratory is the Power and Energy Vehicle Environmental Lab (PEVEL), which the Army describes as “one of the world’s most unique test chambers.” This environmental laboratory will allow for full mission profile testing under various environmental conditions, including temperatures ranging from -60 to 160° F, relative humidity to 95%, and wind speeds 60 mph. The PEVEL can also accommodate hybrid-electric (HE) and fuel-cell vehicles, and researchers can simulate terrain information for various proving grounds and locations throughout the world, replicating almost any road condition in a controlled environment.
“Without leaving metro Detroit, the Army can now perfectly simulate a scorching desert day in Afghanistan or a bone-chilling day in Antarctica with some relatively simple adjustments in temperature, humidity, wind speed, and solar simulator controls,” Bochenek said. “Those extreme environmental conditions are paired with equipment that controls and measures power transfer at different points on a vehicle, enabling drive-train modifications to ensure the most efficient energy transfer possible—no matter what the weather. Best of all, with one lab complex, it is now possible to test every manned and unmanned wheeled vehicle in the U.S. military fleet. This breadth and depth in one location means new and unparalleled access to data to define new capability and innovation in vehicle power and technology.”
The White House said that as part of required road tests of advanced energy technologies and systems developed at the GSPEL, the Army plans to launch a Green Warrior Convoy of vehicles in 2013. The convoy will test and demonstrate the Army's advanced vehicle power and technology including fuel cells, hybrid systems, battery technologies, and alternative fuels. The convoy will visit colleges, communities, and military facilities. The Green Warrior Convoy vehicles will complement the Army Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, or STEM, Asset Vehicle. The STEM Asset Vehicle, launched in January, like the Green Warrior Convoy, is designed to publicize STEM careers and demonstrate how civilian scientists and engineers help to ensure America's national security along with uniformed Soldiers.
The DoD's commitment to clean energy comes in the form of a goal to deploy 3 GW of renewable energy—including solar, wind, biomass, and geothermal—on Army, Navy, and Air Force installations by 2025. This effort furthers an earlier goal of deploying 1 GW of renewable energy on Navy installations by 2020. The Air Force goal of obtaining 1 GW by 2016 and the Army goal of obtaining 1 GW by 2025 support the broader DoD goal to meet 25% of its energy needs with renewable energy by 2025. The DoD said it can achieve these goals at no additional cost to the taxpayer by leveraging private-sector financing through authorities such as Power Purchase Agreements, Enhanced Use Lease, Utility Energy Savings Contracts, and Energy Savings Performance Contracts.
The initiative to make energy storage more effective and safe is taking place through the Energy Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), which is funding a $30 million research competition that will engage scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs in improving the capability of energy-storage devices, including batteries. ARPA-E’s new Advanced Management and Protection of Energy-storage Devices (AMPED) program will promote the development of next-generation energy storage sensing and control technologies, including enhancing the performance of hybrid energy storage modules being developed by the DoD for war-fighting equipment. Specifically, the agency reports, AMPED technologies have the potential to
• increase the fuel efficiency of military generators to help reduce the need for fuel-convoys on the battlefield,
• improve the reliability of military aircraft generators to help to reduce operation and maintenance costs,
• enable next-generation high-power weapons systems and fuel efficient operations for Navy ships,
• create a new generation of electric and hybrid-electric vehicles, and
• enhance the efficiency and reliability of the U.S. electricity grid.
To date, ARPA-E has hosted four rounds of competitions and attracted over 5,000 applications from research teams, resulting in approximately 180 projects.
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