TECHNOLOGY FOCUS
Transportation
A roundup of recent advances in engineering technology. In this issue, a look at developments in road and maritime transportation.
NO RANGE ANXIETY FOR THIS HYDROGEN TRUCK
One barrier to adopting electric or alternative-fuel vehicles is the concern that when the tank runs dry or the battery runs low, there will be no place to refuel or recharge. A demonstration run of a prototype truck designed for emergency response missions showed that one way to beat range anxiety is by extending the range.
In October 2024, the H2Rescue truck successfully completed a 1,806-mile journey on a single hydrogen fill. The truck was powered by a Cummins Accelera fuel cell engine, which sent electricity to a 250 kW traction motor.
The truck is being developed through a collaboration between Cummins and various government agencies, including the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Science & Technology Directorate, and the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory.
“This project started with an idea on paper when we saw some of the wildfires that were ravaging California,” said Nick Josefik, an industrial engineer with the Corps of Engineers and H2Rescue team lead, in a press statement. "A group of researchers from the different federal agencies came together and asked, ‘How can we create something that could support those emergency situations?’”
AUTONOMOUS TRUCKS START TEXAS ROUTES
In December 2024, Volvo Autonomous Solutions and DHL Supply Chain launched autonomous freight operations in the United States as part of a validation of the full ecosystem required for autonomous transport at scale. Freight will initially be hauled on two lanes in Texas: Dallas to Houston and Fort Worth to El Paso.
For now, a safety driver will ride along to monitor the performance of the system and take over driving at certain critical junctions. However, the truck, called Volvo VNL Autonomous, has built-in redundancy for critical systems, Volvo said, with these systems replacing the backup provided by a human driver. Instead, the redundant systems can automatically take control in the rare case of primary systems encountering an issue.
Autonomous trucking is a hot field. In August 2024, Kodiak Robotics announced it had reached 50,000 autonomous miles on its truck route between Atlanta and Dallas.
WIND TUNNEL TESTS FOR SAIL FREIGHTER
Swedish shipbuilder Wallenius Marine began advanced wind tunnel tests in December 2024 on a model of its design of a wind-powered vessel for carrying cars and trucks. The model is 5 meters by 2 meters and weighs 1.2 metric tons.
The goal of the tests is to simulate the full aerodynamic performance of the ship. Previously, wing sails have been tested independently without a hull.
The tests are being carried out at an advanced wind tunnel facility in Gothenburg. The facility can produce wind speeds as high as 250 kilometers per hour.
Some of the areas of investigation include testing the interaction between the vessel's hull and six high-tech wing sails and determining the optimal distance between hull and wing.
SIMULATION LOOKS TO CUT AV TRAINING TIME
One challenge to developing machine-learning systems is providing a large enough training set. That’s especially true for self-driving systems, for which training requires hours on the road.
Ansys is collaborating with Sony Semiconductor Solutions to provide realistic simulations of driving conditions to enable autonomous driving assistance systems and autonomous vehicles to train without hitting the pavement.
Ansys’s sensor platform generates a virtual environment with varied lighting, weather, and material conditions, including how light hits the camera lens under these conditions. Sony’s sensor model can reproduce the data characteristics of its high-definition imaging chips. Together, these systems can feed realistic road data to machine learning models.
PORSCHE UNVEILS ELECTRIC SPORTS BOAT
The Porsche brand is known for high-end automobiles, but in December it presented the result of a partnership with Austrian-based Frauscher Shipyard: an 8.67-meter-long, 2.49-meter-wide electric boat featuring the all-electric drive unit from the Porsche Macan Turbo.
The Frauscher x Porsche 850 Fantom is a classic runabout with a closed foredeck and cabin. It has a cruising-speed range of 45 km and a top speed of 49 knots.
The boat’s permanently excited synchronous motor can deliver up to 400 kW. Control units are housed in a waterproof box displaying the Porsche logo. In addition to the electric drive, the high-voltage battery with a gross capacity of 100 kWh also comes from the Macan.
The limited-edition boat doesn’t come cheap. The Frauscher x Porsche 850 Fantom starts at €572,934.
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