Students Unveil SUVs of Tomorrow - FutureTruck Enters Final Stage of Competition

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YUCCA, Ariz., June 11 -- School may be out for summer, but teams of students from 15 top North American university engineering departments are still hard at work putting the finishing touches on 15 advanced technology SUVs. Today the students enter the final stage of the FutureTruck competition at Ford's Arizona Proving Grounds.

The FutureTruck challenge is to re-engineer a mid-size 2002 Ford Explorer to improve fuel economy and lower emissions while retaining the vehicle's utility and customer appeal. The 15 competing teams employ many novel ideas and approaches that provide both near-term and long-term solutions to increasing the efficiency and decreasing the overall environmental impact of light-duty vehicles.

While all of the teams have implemented a hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) design strategy, eight of the team's engines were modified to run on ethanol, three will use bio-diesel, one will use ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel and one will use reformulated gasoline. Two other teams have selected a more advanced long-term propulsion solution -- hydrogen fuel cells. Additional technical goals for the competition include reduction of total greenhouse gases and the promise of emerging exhaust gas treatment technologies to further reduce tailpipe emissions.

The final competition stage involves more than ten days of intense testing, such as acceleration and off-road performance events in Arizona and California to determine which team will win the challenge. The winning university team will be announced June 21st in Beverly Hills, CA.

Ford Motor Company and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), through its Argonne National Laboratory, are the headline sponsors for the 2002 FutureTruck competition. More than 16 other government and industry sponsors also support the program.

"FutureTruck gives engineering students invaluable real-world experience and the opportunity to understand the challenge of making breakthrough technologies practical for high-volume vehicles," said Sue Cischke, Ford vice president -- Environmental and Safety Engineering. "The challenge every automaker is grappling with is how to affordably deliver hybrid electric or fuel cell technologies in a no-compromise vehicle. That's exactly what this competition is all about."

"Engineering improvements are critical to achieving improved automotive fuel economy and reduced emissions in the United States," said Bob Larsen, Director of the Center for Transportation Research at Argonne National Laboratory. "We are proud to support FutureTruck because we believe that cooperation among government, industry and academia is the best approach to the fuel economy issue."

Ford has supplied new 2002 Explorers, engineering consulting for each team and more than $200,000 in seed money and cash prizes. DOE's Argonne National Laboratory provides competition management, team evaluation and technical and logistical support. In addition to Ford and DOE, sponsors include: National Science Foundation; Cisco Systems; ArvinMeritor; Delphi; National Instruments; Natural Resources Canada; The MathWorks; Aluminum Association; California Air Resources Board; Illinois Department of Commerce and Community Affairs; Wisconsin Soybean Marketing Board; Renewable Fuels Association; Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company; Ricardo, Inc.; and BP.

Vehicle telematics also plays a critical role in the competition. Participating students are working with Cisco Systems; National Instruments; Dearborn Group; Ampro Computers, Inc.; Cellport Systems; SiRF Technology, Inc.; PenTeleData; and Ensco to explore emerging wireless communications, in- vehicle networking, on-board computing and navigation. The innovations developed may improve driver and vehicle safety and potentially reduce the vehicle's overall environmental impact.

Competing universities for FutureTruck 2002 are: California Polytechnic State University San Louis Obispo; Cornell University; Georgia Tech; Michigan Technological University; The Ohio State University; Pennsylvania State University; Texas Tech University; University of California, Davis; University of Idaho; University of Alberta; University of Maryland; University of Tennessee; University of Wisconsin-Madison; Virginia Tech; and West Virginia University.

Additional information about the FutureTruck 2002 program is available on the Web at http://www.futuretruck.org .