Electric storage: Safe, low-cost, scalable,
long-lived and energy-dense
Zheng Li
Assistant
Professor
Research
Focus:
Energy stor-
age design and
manufacturing;
Battery recy-
cling design and
automation;
Energy storage
materials struc-
ture-property-
performance
relationships
The rapidly dropping cost of wind and solar
electricity generation, as illustrated by level-
ized costs of electricity (LCOE) that are now
competitive with fossil fuel generation, high-
lights the need for low-cost electrical storage
that can transform intermittent renewable
power into predictable and dispatchable
electricity generation, and potentially base-
load power. Such a revolutionary outcome
will require energy storage with costs well
below the trajectory of current technology,
while also being safe, scalable, long-lived,
and sufficiently energy dense for widespread
deployment, including in space-constrained
environments.
Virginia Tech researchers will team up with
MIT, Form Energy, Inc. and Sepion Technologies, Inc. to develop a long-duration energy stor-
age system that takes advantage of the low cost and high abundance of sulfur in a water-based
solution. Prof. Zheng Li is co-PI of this project funded by US DOE Advanced Research Projects
Agency–Energy (ARPA-E).
Rear seat crash testing
improves safety
Warren Hardy
Associate
Professor
Research
Focus:
Impact and
injury response
and tolerance
properties of
biological mate-
rials; Macro and
micro mecha-
nisms of trau-
ma; Automotive
crash testing
Current U.S. occupant protec-
tion regulatory dynamic test for
frontal impacts, and the NCAP
frontal test do not include the
evaluation of occupant safety
for rear seat occupants. The
hypothesized propensity of
occupants to sit in the rear of
ADS-DVs (Automated Driving
Systems-Driverless Vehicles)
could have a considerable ad-
verse effect on occupant inju-
ries and fatalities. The fact that
the risk of injury in frontal col-
lisions is higher for occupants
in rear seats than for front
seats warrants consideration of
improved rear-seat safety performance and evaluation. The study,
conducted in the Center for Injury Biomechanics (CIB), examines
the safety performance of second-row seating. The vehicles are
turned into crash sled bucks by removing the powertrain and sus-
pension, and reinforcing the passenger compartment. The bucks
are mounted to the CIB’s ServoSled and subjected to NCAP crash
pulses. Two Anthropomorphic Test Devices (ATDs) are positioned
in rear seating locations. The ATD responses are compared to that
of Post Mortem Human Surrogates. This study is examining the
expected incidences and outcomes of rear-seated occupants in an
ADS-DV with conventional seats, and is assessing candidate injury
criteria for rear-seated occupants for FMVSS No. 208 frontal
crash testing.
22 Revised and Corrected, Nov. 2019
Configurations of the
Hybrid III (left) and THOR
(right) dummies after an
NCAP test on a crash sled.
The THOR has slipped
under the seatbelt, or
“submarined”.