PcVue supervises the world´s largest
experiment with rechargeable hybrid vehicles

EDF (Electricité de France), Toyota and the Strasbourg area council have selected PcVue SCADA software, developed by ARC Informatique, for a joint three-year project titled Kléber. This is a full-scale experiment with a fleet of 70 rechargeable hybrid vehicles (RHV) and 145 charging stations throughout the Strasbourg urban area. Value for money, short lead times and industrial know-how all played a crucial role in the selection process.

In May 2010 Toyota, EDF and Strasbourg City and Urban Community launched a joint project named Kléber for full-scale demonstration of rechargeable hybrid vehicles (RHV). This three-year programme has three main aims: to study user expectations of RHV technology and recharging infrastructure, to verify RHV performance in real situations and to develop methods for evaluating fuel consumption and CO2 emission.

This experiment is vital as Toyota is now marketing a plug-in version of its well-known Prius range. The Kléber programme is part of a world-wide project rolled out by Toyota, with 600 Prius RHVs also being tested in Japan, the United States, England, Canada and Australia. For EDF it is an opportunity to test the charging facilities in practice. »Experiments are essential for assessing technical solutions, usage and economic models», explains Igor Czerny, EDF´s Electric Transport and Vehicles Director. The Kléber project is the largest experiment of its kind in the world with a fleet of 70 RHVs and 145 charging stations, almost all connected via 3G, to be tested by selected users. The 145 stations are installed in all the places one might expect: at the roadside (8 stations), in public car parks (18), at the vehicle owners´ homes (44) and in the ca  parks of the businesses where they work (75).

Pictures top to bottom: 1) The Kléber project is a full-scale experiment based on a fleet of 70 rechargeable hybrid vehicles(Toyota Prius RHV) and 145 charging stations installed by EDF throughout the Strasbourg urban area. 2) PcVue home page 3) display of charging station sites around the city Strasb5.jpeg: display of the condition of a charging station

One year into the experiment, the EDF and Toyota teams have analyzed the technical data by gathering the information output by the communicating charging stations, uploading the data recorded in the RHVs during visits to the dealer and analyzing user questionnaires and field surveys.

To manage the remotely metered portion of the charging data from the EDF stations, the sponsors of the Kléber project selected PcVue SCADA software developed by ARC Informatique. »This is a proven and reliable industrial tool that is used to supervise numerous devices in many large-scale projects around the world. Our choice was influenced by its meeting our specified requirements for performance and value for money.» states Thierry Meunier, project manager at EDF Electric Transport and Vehicles. Examples of recent major projects in which the PcVue solution has distinguished itself include that of Iberdrola the Spanish power utility which selected the software to monitor its wind farms that generate 3600 megawatts from 35 separate plants in the USA.

Responsive service by ARC Informatique and the service provider who installed PcVue was also an important factor for the Kléber project. "The contractor´s responsiveness was of prime importance for setting up this programme. The project was only defined in autumn 2009 and kicked off at the start of 2010, which is a very short lead time for one of this size." stresses EDF´s Thierry Meunier.

The function of the PcVue supervisor is to collect data for transfer to a computer system for analysis. The data are processed directly by PcVue for display in animated views (with mimic diagrams) using pre-defined object symbols that can be instantiated in the mimics. The acquired data are translated into standard PcVue objects and then archived into databases for processing via analytical software such as for spreadsheets.

In the Kléber project, the data acquired by the charging stations are transmitted over a 3G network and managed by PcVue. The database compiled by PcVue using the information collected from them is shared with an EDF central server via a web service. This means that the data can be consulted over the Internet or an intranet via secure access.

The PcVue software keeps a central database for recording the behavior of the charging stations´ users throughout the Strasbourg urban area and for logging the usage of the stations. It also provides real-time management of any charging station that malfunctions, for improving maintenance of the overall system. For further information, view website: www.arcinfo.com  Refer to page 83 

Printed Electronics Invigorates Old Electronics   by Dr Peter Harrop, Chairman, IDTechEx

Most of the well-known objectives of printed electronics remain elusive because they are glamorous, Olympian dreams based on some very exciting demonstrations in laboratories. For example, we plan stretchable, invisible solar cells to go over the whole of a car or building and tightly rollable colour screens and keyboards that unfurl from inside a tiny mobile telephone. That does not mean that there is no progress with printed electronics but most of it is of the nature of, "In a gold rush, get there first and sell shovels."

Raghu Das, CEO of IDTechEx and co-author  of the annual, "Printed, Organic & Flexible Electronics Forecasts, Players & Opportunities 2011-2021" (www.IDTechEx.com/pe) says, "The giant East Asian electronics companies often remind us that there are huge gains being made with printed electronics but most are out of sight of the public. They cite one printed layer replacing several non-printed layers in LCD flat screen television screens, greatly reducing the cost. This is a more sophisticated application of the principle used to print membrane keyboards and battery electrodes."

Indeed, the public will not know or care that third generation lithium-ion batteries are printed and solid state but they will be aware of the doubling of the all-electric range of their electric car that results. This will let them use more electricity by plugging in at night: it is one fifth the cost of gasoline per mile. Add to that the plan of T-Ink Inc to replace heavy, expensive printed wiring in road vehicles with printed wiring. There are now a huge number of enhancements to existing products in the marketplace thanks to printed electronics and they do more than enhance the profits and market share of companies. To the satisfaction of their investors, some of the leaders are being bought by ambitious chemical and electronics companies.

For example, chemicals and materials giant DuPont announced recently that it has acquired Innovalight, Inc., a company specializing in advanced nano-silicon inks and process technologies that increase the efficiency of crystalline silicon solar cells. Basically, the extra layer improves efficiency by a precious few percent.

The acquisition further strengthens DuPont's position as a clear leader in materials for the solar energy market, enabling a broader and more integrated photovoltaic materials and technology offering from DuPont. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. DuPont exceeded $1 billion in revenue from sales into the conventional photovoltaic market in 2010, and it has set a goal to reach $2 billion by 2014 based on continued growth supported by new innovations that improve solar module efficiency, lifetime and overall system costs. In other words, there is much for it to contribute long before we have ubiquitous flexible photovoltaics.

"Innovalight has very exciting technology that improves cell efficiency and DuPont can help expedite its adoption,"said David B. Miller, president - DuPont Electronics & Communications. "DuPont and Innovalight share a commitment to innovation in materials that have a common purpose - to make solar energy more efficient and more affordable."

The press release told us that Innovalight, located in Sunnyvale, California, has developed innovative proprietary silicon ink products, process technology and a pipeline of anticipated products. Silicon inks used in conjunction with DuPont™ Solamet® photovoltaic metallization pastes boost the amount of electricity produced from sunlight, enabling the production of superior Selective Emitter solar cells. The press release said that, according to industry estimates, Selective Emitter technology could represent 13 percent of crystalline silicon solar cell production by 2013 and up to 38 percent by 2020.

"Innovalight brings in-depth knowledge of solar devices, silicon technology and Selective Emitter technology, and DuPont adds expertise in materials science, manufacturing capabilities and global market access," said Conrad Burke, founder - Innovalight. "Our offerings are complementary to one another, and together we will broaden and accelerate our ability to meet customer needs and address today's energy challenges with our continued innovations."

DuPont anticipates that the acquisition will enable opportunities for greater efficiencies and future innovations which could more quickly and effectively help address the market demand for higher-efficiency solar cell designs. DuPont experience in production scale-up and manufacturing operations will accelerate time-to-market for Innovalight products and broaden customers' access to the technology.

In addition, DuPont's broad range of offerings in photovoltaic module materials, including backsheet films and encapsulants, will help accelerate adoption of new high efficiency solar cells that need to be packaged into modules to meet in-field performance requirements. 

Innovalight is one of a large number of exciting new companies transforming the electronics scene by updating old products with printed electronics. Kovio in Milpitas is printing the logic in the electronic tickets of the Los Angeles Metro, replacing the silicon chip, saving cost. Forget what people told you about printed electronics not threatening the silicon chip. The world's largest event on printed electronics, Printed Electronics USA is in Silicon Valley for good reason. It is in Santa Clara November 30 to December 1 this year and will be covering the entire value chain - see: www.IDTechEx.com/peUSA

This event will see presentations from organisations enhancing existing products with printed electronics, including OTB group ink jet printing in solar cell mass production, Solexant optimising solar cell production and Boeing Spectrolab further enhancing the efficiency of its record breaking photovoltaics on space craft and bringing that technology to earthbound use. Indeed, parent company Boeing is giving a separate presentation of, "Applications, Needs and Requirements of Printed Electronics in Aerospace" because organisers IDTechEx pride themselves on having exceptional numbers of end users present. 

Then there are visible improvements to existing products following the billions of battery testers printed onto Duracell batteries by Avery Dennison and all those OLED displays on phones and cameras. Here we have the animation of the Cluedo board game by T-Ink and the group of companies that animated a magazine cover recently using NTera printed colour displays and entirely printed battery and logic. In this spirit, Printed Electronics USA will see Oxylane describe the integration of electronic functionality into sports apparel for instance and Amy Winters on printed electronics in clothing. It even extends to security printing with De La Rue, both developer and potential user, describing "Power into Paper - A New Paradigm" because, yes, printed electronics on paper is a significant part of the subject nowadays, where spear Stora Enso of Sweden also has something to say. Then there is "Bio-integrated Soft Electronics" to be described by the University of Illinois and the conformal ViviTouch stickers that are a new dimension to actuators created by Artificial Muscle, the electroactive polymer device creator recently snapped up by the giant Bayer of Germany. Yes, there is a pattern to this new patterning industry.

For further information view  website: www.IDTechEx.com/peUSA or contact Cara Harrington, e-mail: c.harrington@IDTechEx.com  Refer to page 130