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MAN researches hybrid bus of tomorrow
Volvo Trucks delivers 50
trucks to Sabot
MAN Truck & Bus is participating in the EU research project ECOCHAMPS. The aim of the
project is to further develop hybrid technology in various fields of application.
Under the umbrella of the EU’s “Horizon 2020” project, the ECOCHAMPS project develops
hybrid technology for passenger and commercial vehicles. The aim of this consortium, which
consists of a total of 26 partners, is to develop an efficient, compact, robust and cost-effective
hybrid driveline for the various intended purposes.
As one of the partners involved, MAN is building a hybrid bus that should be up to 20% more
efficient in the drive line. “In the city bus segment in particular, we are seeing huge potential
for using eMobility applications. However, the total cost of ownership plays an especially
significant role for transport operators and carriers,” explains Dr. Götz von Esebeck, head of
eMobility at MAN Truck & Bus.
MAN sees the hybrid drive as a meaningful addition to its product portfolio at this time.
Hybrid buses can make a valuable contribution to low-emissions traffic both as a bridging
technology until purely electric transit buses are introduced onto the market and as an addition
to the vehicles used currently, for example in shuttle traffic bringing passengers from non-urban
areas into inner-cities.
Furthermore, in vehicles with conventional drives, hybrid technology can also contribute
significantly to both environmental protection and economy, by recovering braking energy,
saving it for a short period, and using it for auxiliary drives, for example. For this very reason,
as part of this project, MAN is developing a concept for a basic vehicle with electric driveline.
Depending on customer requirements, different energy sources can then be integrated, for
example a diesel generator or a fuel cell. This will also make it easy to add additional storage
capacity to a purely battery-electric vehicle which is charged in the depot.
b
Drones at their disruptive best
The drone revolution is disrupting a broad spectrum of industries ranging from agriculture, mining, transport & logistics, to
filmmaking. The addressable market value of drone-powered solutions is valued at over $127 billion, according to a report recently
issued by PwC.
This is the value of current business services and labour that are likely to be replaced in the near future by drone-powered
solutions. The industry with the best prospects for drone applications is infrastructure, with a total addressable market value of
about $45,2 billion.
How to digitise your supply chain
According to Strato IT Group’s Miguel Jorge, the combination of cloud computing, mobility and digitisation enables businesses to be
proactive and improve logistics processes cost effectively, while at the same time, improving customer satisfaction.
“It is a mind-set that needs to change, understanding that mobile computing is not only relevant to consumer-facing businesses,”
says Jorge. “Cloud computing is accessible anywhere anytime and is cost effective; mobile computing is not limited to consumer
applications and can be used effectively to improve business and digitisation of logistics processes allows for important
documentation and processes to be converted into usable data.”
IN BRIEF
Overland cross-border transport company
South African Botswana Haulers (Sabot)
Management Limited recently received
its first instalment of 15 of a total of 50
Volvo Truck vehicle combinations that the
company purchased from Volvo Trucks.
This increases the total operating fleet of
the company to 462 vehicles all of which
are exclusively Volvo trucks and the latest
addition to their fleet the new generation
FMX 400 6x4 truck tractor.
“Volvo Trucks is proud to be a partner
of SABOT since 1992. We hope that our
association will continue as we strive to be
the best cross-border transport provider on
the continent,” says Malcom Gush, irector
Truck Sales, Volvo Group South Africa.
Sabot specialises in the cross-border
transport industry. The company’s footprint
extends throughout Africa with offices in
South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Namibia
and the Democratic Republic of Congo,
with countries travelled to including
Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe,
Mozambique and South Africa. Sabot has
over 1 200 trailers and nearly 500 Volvo
truck tractors.
b
Sabot already has a huge fleet of Volvo
vehicles.
MAN will present the basic hybrid bus, developed as part of the ECOCHAMPS project, to the
public in Q4 of 2017.
CAPITAL EQUIPMENT NEWS
JULY 2017
39