BCIT hosts elected officials for tour of OASIS

by

Delegates from the BC Municipalities Convention (UBCM) visted BCIT’s Burnaby campus to explore the future of electric vehicles.

Elected officials came together to learn about the sustainable energy being created at BCIT. They participated in a lesson on electric vehicles and took a tour of BCIT’s Energy OASIS project.

Eve Hou, the air quality planner with Metro Vancouver helped to organize the event. She said “our ultimate goal is to reduce our carbon footprint. In this region 1/3 of our carbon emissions collectively are from vehicles”.

The Charging Station:

Clay Howey, Research Head at BCIT, showed delegates the inside of the Panasonic battery

Clay Howey, Research Head at BCIT was teaching delegates about how the  electric “gas station” creates the power for the cars.

There are solar panels on top of a canopy in the parking lot which generate energy. The energy is then stored in lithium-ion batteries and charging stations.

The BCIT OASIS microgrid has a unique feature. This is the only solar instillation on campus that is not on the grid.

Howey said for the other ones  “the inverter is tied to the grid and receives the AC signal from the grid and if it loses the signal it shuts down for safety reasons”.

Since OASIS has technology to prevent this, in the event of a black out it can continue to produce energy.

The charging stations look similar to regular gas stations and receive their power from OASIS.

What it’s like to own an Electric vehicle:

Emile Struyk, a member of the Vancouver Electric Vehicle Association and his electric car

Emile Struyk, a member of the Vancouver Electric Vehicle Association has owned his Nissan Leaf for just over a year. He said he has wanted one since he finished his degree in electrical engineering.

Struyk said it’s great on maintenance, since there are no oil changes or other things you have deal with in traditional automobiles.

He also said it is faster on the acceleration than a similar model that runs on gasoline.

Struyk found it exciting to share his enthusiasm about the future of electric vehicles with those visiting.

Read more about how this project as made the list of “top 50 innovations to watch” here.

 

 

Leave a comment