Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - ELVITEN (Electrified L-category Vehicles Integrated into Transport and Electricity Networks)

Teaser

The market penetration of light electric vehicles (EL-Vs) is low. This is attributed to the users’ low awareness about the EL-Vs performance and functionalities, concerns about cost and range and lack of consistent knowledge and information needed by planning authorities to...

Summary

The market penetration of light electric vehicles (EL-Vs) is low. This is attributed to the users’ low awareness about the EL-Vs performance and functionalities, concerns about cost and range and lack of consistent knowledge and information needed by planning authorities to prepare an adequate traffic and charge infrastructure for EL-Vs. ELVITEN addresses all these issues aiming:
• To increase the EL-V usage in urban areas, through the development of replicable usage schemes of EL-Vs, targeting vehicle owners, sharers and light goods deliverers, in order to achieve a modal shift from ICE vehicles to EL-Vs.
• To deploy EL-Vs innovative parking and charge services, to facilitate users to easily park and charge at the most convenient locations in the urban environment,
• To deploy EL-Vs sharing and rental services, to facilitate users’ ability to book and pay for shared EL-Vs for transport or delivery trips.
• To deploy support ICT tools to facilitate and motivate the usage of EL-Vs instead of ICE vehicles.
• To enforce appropriate policies and incentives to facilitate and motivate EL-V usage by private and professional users and by fleet owners instead of ICE vehicles.
• To organise long-term demonstrations in 6 Cities which cover different European regions, traffic environments and contextual background, involving all categories of EL-Vs.
• To create a big data bank of real driving and usage data of EL-Vs and private and professional users’ experiences and opinions about EL-Vs from different geographical regions.
• To derive guidelines towards EL-V manufacturers for the new generation of EL-Vs and towards Planning Authorities for the promotion of support policies and incentives and for the preparation of the necessary transport and charge infrastructure.
• To develop business models for EL-V sharing, rental, parking and charge services, possibly based on public-private partnerships, which will be easily replicable to different contexts in other cities and regions.

Work performed

Within the reporting period, the mobility demand, user needs, opportunities and barriers to EL-V use in each of the Demonstration Cities, Bari, Berlin, Genoa, Malaga, Rome and Trikala, were gathered. The work was based on statistical data regarding the transport networks and mobility usage in each city, data from a large-scale public questionnaire survey (approximately 7000 responses) covering current users travel patterns, willingness to use different types of EL-V, and perceptions of advantages and barriers to using EL-Vs and data from a set of targeted interview surveys of fleet operators and professional drivers. The most promising usage schemes and target user clusters for the best integration of EL-Vs into the existing transport and mobility network in each city have been determined. An analysis of the current situation in each city has been conducted, to be used as reference baseline in the analysis phase. Finally, a harmonised methodology for running the demonstrations in the different Cities was defined, including the study questions, the indicators, the data needed for their calculation and the tools to collect the required data.

ICT tools have been developed to provide a satisfying and motivating experience to EL-Vs users during the demonstrations and beyond. A Unifying App has been developed in order to improve user experience and boost the EL-Vs usage. Through this App, the users have access to all the ICT assets available in their city. The ICT tools developed and deployed are: the Driver App, which allows the EL-V users to improve their driving behaviour; the Fleet Management web application, that gives to the operators all the necessary information on the status of the EL-Vs; the Booking app, that allows drivers to book EL-Vs, parking places and charging points; the Incentive App, that gives the users the possibility to benefit from their commitment to the ELVITEN project and the Serious game app, which provides, through entertainment, useful information about the project and about the advantages of using EL-Vs.
In parallel, all cities started the preparation of their demonstrations putting in place the needed assets and resources. Short pilot dry-run tests have been conducted with limited numbers of participants where all services and the ICT tools have been verified that operate smoothly before the demonstrations start. Within the reporting period, the demonstrations started in Trikala and Berlin, while they will start shortly in the rest Cities.
To evaluate the citizens’ attitudes towards EL-Vs but also towards the ELVITEN services and apps, a variety of data are being logged, that are relevant to EL-V usage, such as users’ trips and charging activities, and to the usage of the ELVITEN services and apps. In addition, the users’ opinions and attitudes are collected through questionnaires administered via the services and apps supporting the project. The data are sent to a dedicated data warehouse and are available for analysis purposes via the ELVITEN Dashboard. Data integrity and security are handled via secure communications, validation of data providers, and validation of message content, weekly data backup and access control applied to all levels. The datasets produced by ELVITEN demonstrations will be made openly available after the end of the project, following the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) principles. Metadata based on the OpenAIRE guidelines for Data Archives have been foreseen for usage data from loggers and for questionnaire data from users.
Wide communication campaigns have been organised to inform citizens and stakeholders about the project and to attract them to participate actively in the demonstrations. Regional Support Groups have been established, to guarantee the project dissemination and the promotion of EL-Vs in a local context.

Final results

ELVITEN assesses the consumers’ needs and expectations in each of the Demonstration Cities via its detailed background studies and via the analysis of the logged trip data and users’ perceptions and experiences. The potential market penetration of EL-Vs and their impacts on the city level will be assessed via cost benefit analyses and via business modelling work.
The users’ familiarisation with the EL-Vs due to the long demonstrations of ELVITEN in the various cities and the guidelines to manufacturers and Planning Authorities will speed up the penetration of EL-Vs in the market. The partners have started discussions with additional authorities and will formalise agreements in the next reporting period.
The trip data and questionnaires to be collected as well as the reports on problems by users will result in guidelines towards manufacturers so that they can develop the new generation of EL-Vs more in accordance to users’ needs and expectations.
Using the collected data ELVITEN will develop business model proposals for sharing, rental, parking and charging services of EL-Vs and for ICT tools developers.
The increase in the market uptake of EL-Vs due to ELVITEN is expected to de-congest and de-carbonise urban mobility, thus improving the quality of life in urban environments. The project findings as regards real usage of EL-Vs, charging behaviour and users’ experiences and preferences will lead to the definition of guidelines for Planning Authorities as regards the most appropriate policies to support EL-Vs deployment in each City.

Website & more info

More info: https://www.elviten-project.eu/en.