Elektroladestationen: Foto: © Flughafen München

Intelligent charging strategies: Research into climate-friendly employee mobility at Munich Airport

A rapid expansion of electric mobility is an important contribution to more climate neutrality in transport. For this, an intelligent, centrally planned charging strategy is essential that takes into account the relevant factors influencing the charging of electric vehicles. This is where the consortium project “OPELA”, led by the Fraunhofer IIS working group for Supply Chain Services, comes in: Using the example of employee mobility at Munich Airport, research is being conducted into how such a system must be designed in order to be sustainably successful. The research project has been running since September 2022 until August 2023 and is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport as part of the mFUND innovation initiative.

How e-mobility makes the commute more sustainable

The “OPELA” research project is dedicated to an important subarea of climate-neutral transport: employee mobility. Munich Airport – with its own energy supply from photovoltaic systems and a combined heat and power plant, as well as a vehicle fleet that has to meet the mobility needs of its many employees – offers ideal conditions for this. One concern of the project is to make electromobility sustainable and attractive both for the commute to work and for journeys on the airport campus. To achieve this, not only must the charging infrastructure be expanded in a targeted manner, but an optimal charging strategy is also needed to make the best possible use of the energy.
The “OPELA” project is being funded with a total of 100,000 euros by the Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport as part of the mFUND innovation initiative.

Emission savings through an intelligent charging strategy for electric vehicles

The rapid expansion of electromobility poses new challenges for the stability of power grids as well as the effectiveness of charging. Researchers from the Supply Chain Services group at the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS are working on this together with the Julius Maximilians University of Würzburg in the “OPELA” project. They are developing a concept for an intelligent, centrally planned charging strategy for sustainable employee mobility at Munich Airport. This concept takes into account relevant influencing factors, such as the availability of charging stations or renewable energies. This charging strategy must also be constantly adapted to new circumstances such as weather or charging requests and give priority to higher-priority charging processes.

First of all, the extensive mobility and energy data available at Munich Airport will be processed and evaluated. Based on this, it is examined how the real problem can be mapped in a simulation and solved by means of optimisation procedures. For the developed concepts, possible savings potentials are estimated with the help of individual scenarios. Finally, all findings will be summarised in a concept study.

The aim of the research project is to conceptualise an operational, sustainable and energy-efficient charging strategy, which, combined with the simulation of the energy and mobility system, also creates the basis for strategic planning of the charging infrastructure. The aim is to promote the expansion of electromobility not only from a technical point of view, but also from the perspective of the users.

On Wednesday, 23.11.2022, 9:00 – 10:30 a.m., the consortium partners together with representatives of the Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport (BMDV) will present the research project “OPELA” in an online event. Scientists and interested parties from the general public, business, administration, politics and the press are invited to participate. Registration for the event by e-mail to: markus.weissenbaeck@iis.fraunhofer.de

www.iis.fraunhofer.de, www.mfund.de

Please follow and like us:

11.11.2022   |  

Related Posts