Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit on Saturday flagged off a solar car with various advanced features and developed by the Delhi Technological University.
The car, named ‘Avenir’, will be sent to participate in the World Solar Challenge being organised in Australia from October 16 to 23. The car will participate in the 3,000 km long race from Darwin to Adelaide.
Powered by multi-crystalline batteries, the car is capable of generating one kilo watt solar electricity and can attain the speed of 85 km per hour.
Flagging off the car, Dikshit commended the DTU for coming out with such an “exciting” innovation.
The World Solar Challenge is the most prestigious event of its kind which attracts the world’s best technical universities and colleges to compete with their innovative designs of solar vehicles.
The aim of the event is to identify technologies which are likely to find way into the production cars of tomorrow.
Highlighting various features of the car, a member of the design team of the vehicel said the steering supported with the aerodynamic design of the car provides for easy handling and reduced drag during driving while the braking system conserves energy when the car stops.
“With the increasing pressure of rising cost of crude oil, the automotive industry in India should turn towards innovative automobile solutions such as solar cars, hybrid vehicles and other such energy efficient vehicles,” said P B Sharma, Vice Chancellor of DTU.
The car has been designed and developed by a DTU team comprising a interdisciplinary group of under-graduates students, which was supervised by J P Kesari, Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering department.
