Case Study:

LCVTP – Low Carbon Vehicle Technology Project

Thermal management testing using 'Radtherm'

The LCVTP is a £29m collaboration project funded by Advantage West Midlands, the European Regional Development Fund and contributions from other project partners to develop next generation low carbon vehicle technologies.

The project concentrates on fifteen separate technical workstreams aiming to develop and validate key technology in areas such as batteries, motors, aerodynamics and systems integration to enable a number of project platforms and next generation low carbon vehicles to be manufactured as “Technology Validation Platforms”.

The objectives of the project are to:

  • Accelerate the introduction of Low & Ultra Low Carbon Vehicle Technologies by 4 years
  • Work through 15 workstreams that when combined will deliver validated technology to support the validation platforms (GTV)
  • Lead to production vehicles through the utilisation of the follow-on technology validators and potential TSB 4 funding
  • Show the potential of these technologies deployed in the form of a Range Extended Electric Vehicle, potentially yielding a 47gm CO2/km Ultra Low carbon emission
  • Identify and develop new supply chains which can be grown within the UK

Other partners involved in the project include: Coventry University, Jaguar Land Rover, Ricardo, Tata, WMG and Zytek.

MIRA’s expertise in the field of LCVTP enables the company to lead the way in a number of key work streams within the LCVTP. These include:

  • Aerodynamics design, testing and development
  • Functional safety – development of hazard and risk assessment
  • Thermal Management Systems – using Radtherm (MIRA’s state of the art Thermal Manikin) to quantify the comfort environment of a vehicle
  • Advanced Technologies encompassing drive motor comparison tools, APU integration test and development, vehicle control and safety strategies
  • Weight optimisation using simulation comparison tools
  • Dynamics – focussing on developing regenerative braking.

The final research results and solutions will be demonstrated on the Generic Technology Vehicle (GTV) project prototype and can be seen at numerous dissemination events. The Low Carbon Technology project has enabled MIRA to accelerate skill growth in the Low Carbon area and has enabled the internationally renowned organisation to obtain further large scale follow-on projects working with a number of new consortia.