Penn State Team to Introduce Its Next EcoCAR Vision

A final vision for the next Penn State EcoCAR will meet the public next week, the university Advanced Vehicle Team announced Wednesday.

The student-driven team has appeared in advanced vehicle-technology competitions since 1988. Most recently, it fielded an entry in the national EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge, a three-year competition. Teams from participating universities retooled a Chevrolet Equinox to maximize fuel efficiency, reduce emissions and maintain the car’s market appeal.

Penn State’s team, or AVT, placed fourth in the third and final year of that contest, in 2011. General Motors and the U.S. Department of Energy sponsored the program.

Both entities are sponsoring the next national EcoCAR contest, which starts this year. Another three-year endeavor, it’s dubbed EcoCAR2: Plugging in to the Future. Teams from participating universities are charged with reengineering a 2013 Chevorlet Malibu ‘into a unique hybrid that increases gas mileage, decreases emissions and maintains consumer acceptability,’ a news release reads.

Already, the Penn State AVT group has spent months designing hybrid concept designs for EcoCAR2. It will introduce its final vehicle architecture in a public event from noon to 3 p.m. Wednesday.

The Thomas D. Larson Pennsylvania Transportation Institute, on University Drive and Hastings Road, will host the event.

Penn State AVT members’ vehicle plan is ‘different from the ideas we’ve used in the past. And we’re looking forward to finally telling the community about it,’ university AVT co-team leader Luke Shepley said in the release.

Other Penn State student-engineering projects related to vehicles will be on display at the Wednesday event. Rick Price, the executive director of Clean Cities Pittsburgh, is scheduled to speak at 1 p.m. about a partnership between his organization and the Penn State AVT group.

Competition events for year one of EcoCAR2 are scheduled for May in Los Angeles.