An environmentally friendly 3D smart charging station design made by three ITS students

ITS Campus, ITS News – Along with the increasing number of electric vehicles in the future, this will also increase the need for a charging station. Departing from this, three students from the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Department of Industrial and System Engineering, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember (ITS) designed a smart charging station as an environmentally friendly supply of electrical energy.

The three of them are Puguh Pambudi, Valiant Tirta Amarta, and Pebiria Vorenza who are part of a team called Ancharg. According to Puguh, the head of the Ancharg team, this innovation is based on the number of charging station needs at this time, but the existing charging stations still come from the State Electricity Company (PLN). “While 55 percent of PLN’s electricity source comes from coal,” said Puguh.

Therefore, continued Puguh, the existing charging station requires renewal innovations that are more environmentally friendly. So they see which existing conditions have the potential to be used as material. “We finally chose solar energy, which we later used as a solar panel powered charging station,” said the student from Tuban.

He explained, the choice of solar energy is based on Indonesia, which is an agricultural country with sufficient solar radiation, around 1,800 kWh / m2 / year. So, according to Puguh, the price of Solar Power Plants (PLTS) is also cheaper, namely 35 percent of the price of electricity produced by PLN.

ITS Ancharg Team Leader Puguh Pambudi shows the smart charging station design made by his team

Besides, Puguh also explained that if the supply of solar energy was insufficient due to the weather, he and his team had prepared spare energy materials. Namely biomass from agricultural waste which will be used by dual-fuel generators to supply electricity to the charging station. “Because agricultural waste in some areas in East Java is quite abundant,” he said.

Furthermore, Puguh added that there are approximately 100 million tonnes of agricultural waste produced by Indonesia each year. This creates an opportunity for his team to take advantage of the potential generated from the biomass of 49.81 GW.

The student of the Department of Mechanical Engineering explained that the smart charging station made by his team will later use solar panels to take direct sunlight. “Furthermore, the heat energy collected by solar panels will be stored in batteries,” he said.

Valiant Tirta Amarta shows his team’s smart charging station

Furthermore, for smart charging stations made from biomass, the process is through processing agricultural waste in a gasifier (a tool to convert biomass into gas). “Later, the processed products are used to drive the generator, so that it can generate electricity,” he explained.

This fifth-semester student also said that their smart charging station design is getting better with the application of renewable and environmentally friendly principles. This can be seen with the use of materials for electrical energy from sunlight and the use of agricultural waste which is processed in the form of biomass. “So that the energy we use can reduce greenhouse gas emissions nationally or commonly known as Zero Carbon Pollution,” he added.

One of the team members, Pebiria Vorenza together with a smart charging station made by her team

Sweet fruit, their efforts have also succeeded in bringing achievements. The smart charging station designed by the ITS Ancharg team has won third place in the EBOTEC.10 Scientific Writing Competition last October. In the competition held by HMIE Gadjah Mada University (UGM), the Ancharg team managed to outperform six other finalists from national universities.

In the future, the guidance team of ITS Mechanical Engineering lecturer Alief Wikarta ST MSc Eng Ph.D. hopes that their design will not only be complete in competitions and just in 3D design innovation. Puguh hopes that the innovations they have initiated can be implemented in real terms in Indonesia. “I hope that the smart charging station that we make can overcome the need for charging stations in the transition period and can reduce the bad environmental impact in Indonesia,” he concluded hopefully. (bob/ris/ITS Public Relations)

An environmentally friendly 3D smart charging station design made by three ITS students