AUB teacher-student team builds first solar car in Arab region

Named Apollo's Chariot—in reference to the Greek god of the sun, the steel-and-fiberglass one-seater vehicle measures five and a half meters in length and two meters in width. It weighs about 700 kilograms, or almost half the weight of an average sedan.

Led by Mechanical Engineering Assistant Professor Daniel Asmar, the team of Elie Maalouf, Amin Kanafani, Ahmed Hammoud, and Rawad el-Jurdi, took almost nine months of dedicated work to build the "Chariot."

With its aerodynamic design, the futuristic-looking vehicle glides over the road quietly. During a demo on campus, Elie maneuvered it effortlessly—forward, backwards, along a curb, then up a small hill. Noise and air pollution do not figure in the dictionary of Apollo's Chariot.

"It looks like a rocket, but moves like a swan," said Amin, adding incredulously: "We actually built a car that runs on a new kind of energy. It's almost like magic!"

"I really hope that, in the near future, I will be able to drive an improved version of this car, everyday—to university, to work, to go out with my friends," added Elie, noting that the longest trip he has made with the Chariot, up till now, was 50 meters.

But Professor Asmar admits that solar-powered vehicles are still years from becoming commercially available. Right now, building one that can be safely driven on the streets would cost more than a million dollars. Nevertheless, they are important for research purposes. Apollo's Chariot cost about $25,000, a sum that was raised through several local and foreign sponsors: Power tech, a Lebanese company that specializes in batteries; Voluntariato Internazionale per lo Sviluppo (VIS), a volunteer Italian association for development; Italian Cooperation, a department within the Italian Foreign Ministry; Byblos Bank; Carrosserie Abillamaa, a Lebanese company that specializes in truck production; Oelle, an Italian manufacturer of farm trucks; Bank of Beirut and Arab Countries (BBAC); Bridgestone tires; and the AUB Department of Mechanical Engineering.

Through 36 small and eight large photovoltaic cells, the car converts solar energy into 1000 watts of power. The components of the car include the cells and batteries, which capture and store the solar energy, and a DC (direct current) motor which converts energy from the batteries into a uniform source of energy. A maximum power point tracker device also maximizes the amount of power delivered from the cells.

"I'm ecstatic," said Professor Asmar. "This is a dream come true for me that would not have been possible without our sponsors."
Asmar said that he had been dreaming to build a solar-powered car ever since he was an undergraduate student at the University of Waterloo in Canada. Asmar joined AUB as an assistant professor at the end of 2007.

"We feel very proud of our achievement," he added. "Usually, researchers don't manage to get their car to run like ours on their first attempt. Of course, our goal is to keep on improving it, so we could compete in next year's World Solar Challenge, representing Lebanon and AUB for the first time."

The World Solar challenge is a 3000-kilometer race by solar electric cars, whose purpose is to promote research on solar energy. It is held in Australia and was first launched in 1987, having taken place nine times since then. The next race is scheduled for 2009.

The team also hopes to promote solar energy locally, by taking the car on a road trip on the highways of Greater Beirut in the fall.