Numerical investigation of solar and wind energy assisted plugged in hybridized engine driven auto-rickshaw/three-wheeler

Abstract

In South-Asian region, Auto-rickshaw (electric/engine driven) is a well-known vehicle. Mostly in India and Bangladesh, people prefer auto-rickshaw for traveling small to medium distances. However, no reliable study has been conducted using both solar and wind energy in auto-rickshaw. This paper is basically a research on using both solar and wind energy in engine driven auto-rickshaw along with a plugged-in hybrid technology. Placement of a wind turbine on the roof of the vehicle is not an effective idea. For this reason, a model of the vehicle is proposed for the placement of the turbine inside the vehicle and the model is validated by ANSYS CFX simulation. The theory and the simulation results match perfectly. From the analysis, it has been found that both the renewable energies will provide approximately 29.34% of the total power to run the vehicle altogether. The vehicle will not only reduce the pressure on national grid electricity but also reduce the greenhouse gas emissions by a large amount, if the conventional one is replaced by the proposed one. A custom drive cycle is also obtained using the vehicle properties and comparing with Asian Urban Drive Cycle. A novel CFD simulation is conducted for wind turbine blade considering reasonable data. Feasibility study of the proposed vehicle is also analyzed in this paper considering cost, weight and emission and a future recharging infrastructure is also proposed for running the vehicle on 100% green energy. Finally, this paper would help researchers for the further development of the combined system.

Keywords

• auto-rickshaw
• wind energy
• solar energy
• renewable energy
• plug-in-hybrid
• emission reduction
• environment-friendly vehicle