Review of the Research Program of the Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles Fourth Report (1998) / Chapter Skim
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Executive Summary
Executive Summary
Pages 1-13
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.i The committee's major tasks were to examine the overall balance and adequacy of the PNGV research program to meet the program goals and requirements (i.e., technical objectives, schedules, and rate of progress) , examine the PNGV 1997 technology selection process, comment on the role of the government after the technology selection process and on how the PNGV program should interface, if appropriate, with other federal research programs.
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Although some technologies have now been dropped, the principal technology areas under development in the PNGV program are energy converters (CIDI engines and fuel cells) , energy storage devices (batteries and flywheels)
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Progress has been made on the Stirling engine, except in the long-term retention and containment of the hydrogen working fluid; for gas turbines, the development of ceramic components has not progressed to the point that a low-risk, ceramic automotive gas turbine development program can be initiated. Nevertheless, the recent stretch research objective for particulate emissions may lead to the reevaluation of continuous combustion engines as potential energy converters.
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From page 4... ...
At the same time, the government will continue to work on high-risk enabling technologies that could be incorporated into subsequent concept vehicles between the year 2000 and 2004. From the inception of the program and with limited resources, the PNGV program has not been able to bring alternative energy converters and storage devices notably fuel cells, gas turbines, Stirling cycle engines, flywheels, and ultracapacitors to the state of development at which they could be selected for the year 2000 concept vehicles.
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PNGV will discontinue development of gas turbine engines, Stirling engines, and ultracapacitors as energy storage devices. Based on calculations and assessments, PNGV computed the relative potential fuel economy of a number of vehicle power train configurations (see Figure ES-1~.
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For example, Mitsubishi has published and reported to the committee that the fuel economy for its gasoline direct-injection engine may approach the fuel economy of the CIDI engine while achieving low-emission vehicle standards. As the PNGV program moves into the concept vehicle development phase, priorities among different technologies must be established.
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Recommendation. The relationship between the criteria for technology selection and the critical requirements of Goal 3 should be made more explicit to facilitate the proper distribution of resources for an ongoing, well structured research and development program.
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EMISSIONS CONTROL FOR COMPRESSION IGNITION DIRECT INJECTION ENGINES The committee (and the PNGV 4SDI engine team) noted in its Phase 3 report that the most technically challenging aspect of the CIDI engine program will be meeting the NOX and particulate emission standards.
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Each new technology is likely to introduce new failure modes and new safety concerns in crash performance, flammability, potential for explosions, electrical shock, and toxicity. The committee decided not to review safety issues in depth with the PNGV technical teams until after the technology selection milestone had been reached; however, the committee is satisfied that the technical teams are aware of
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As the technology selection process for the concept vehicles continues between now and the year 2000, as well as beyond 2000, and as second-generation concept vehicles emerge and production prototypes are developed, the need for a robust and strong systems engineering and analysis team will increase. At this point, the PNGV has done little to incorporate cost modeling, and the committee believes that probabilistic models of vehicle and subsystem costs, with confidence levels, will be important tools for making decisions in the future.
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THE COST CHALLENGE Although significant technical progress has been made in many of the technologies that will be incorporated into the PNGV Goal 3 vehicles, meeting the cost targets remains a formidable challenge. A review of the proprietary cost models and analyses of two of the USCAR partners confirmed the magnitude of the Goal 3 cost challenge.
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Advances in HEV components and the work done to meet goals 1 and 2, as well as industry' s attempts to reduce vehicle weight by using aluminum and other lightweight materials, are improving the prospects that PNGV vehicles will have high fuel efficiency. Assuming that the PNGV/ USCAR partners perform as expected, that attempts to reduce costs are successful, and that the formidable challenge of emission requirements can be overcome, the committee believes that PNGV has allocated adequate resources to the selected technologies to realize, with a high degree of confidence, the year 2000 concept demonstration vehicles and the 2004 production prototype vehicles.
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The government should significantly expand its support for the development of long-term PNGV technologies that have the potential to improve fuel economy, lower emissions, and be commercially viable. Recommendation.
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