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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2022

Electrifying Road Trips to and from National Parks in the Western United States

We evaluate charging infrastructure requirement for electrified long-distance travels to/from national parks in the Western U.S. We conduct a high-resolution spatial and temporal analysis of road trips in the region, accounting for detailed travel volume and pattern, the type of electric vehicles, heterogeneous energy consumption rates depending on driving conditions, charging technology (e.g., power and speed), and charging behavior. The scope includes on-route (or way-point) charging as well as destination charging (in national parks). We estimate the locations and sizes of required charging stations in the entire Western U.S. to enable electrified road trips to/from national parks. We also examine environmental justice and energy equity aspects of projected charging infrastructure (for national parks) in the context of the overall vehicle electrification and charging infrastructure build-out.

ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS,ENERGY PLANNING, POLIC↗
DOE OSTI2024

EVI-RoadTrip™: Electric Vehicle Infrastructure for Road Trips [SWR-22-17]

The EVI-RoadTrip™ tool offers high-resolution refueling network design and analysis to inform electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure development for road trips or long-distance travels. EVI-RoadTrip helps infrastructure planners, analysts, and decision makers evaluate EV energy consumption and corresponding charging demands along the routes-between origin and destination. It considers the projected location and characteristics of charging stations, potential electric grid impacts, and required infrastructure improvements. Strategically located charging stations for long-distance travel are critical to enabling the widespread adoption of EVs by allowing them to travel further beyond city or town boundaries. Sophisticated analysis and planning can identify the points (e.g., corridors) that may require increased availability of EV charging stations to support electrified road trips.

Wood, Eric↗
DOE OSTI2023

Fast Charging Infrastructure for Electrifying Road Trips to and from National Parks in the Western United States

National parks in the Western United States draw over 80 million visitors every year, and most visitors rely on personal cars for their road trips (or long-distance travels). Travel to national parks represents distinct travel demand, as they are typically located in remote areas necessitating long-distance trips. This study investigates the quantity and locations of on-route fast charging infrastructure needed by 2030 to enable seamless travel to/from national parks using electric vehicles in seven target states in the region, employing unprecedented high-resolution spatial and temporal analysis. We find that the required number of fast charging ports for on-route charging infrastructure ranges from 1,200 to 22,000, depending on different assumptions of key input parameters - vehicle electrification rate, charging behavior, average gap between charging stations, port utilization rate, and towing trailers. Our analysis also indicates that electrical load for on-route fast charging infrastructure would peak in the afternoon, in the range of 70-400 MW, varying with the key input parameters. This study illustrates how different input parameters result in different degrees of impact on various aspects of charging infrastructure. We also examine the characteristics of projected charging infrastructure in terms of land use type, relationship with traffic volume, size of stations, and other variables.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2022

Electrified Road Trips, Charging Infrastructure, and Equity

This presentation discusses the following key research questions: Where do we need on-route (or waypoint) and destination chargers, and how many? What is the impact of seasonal variations in both general road trips (e.g., Thanksgiving) and those related to recreational destinations (e.g., national parks)? Do we have appropriate electric grid ready along the routes? What equity implications would be worth considering?

ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Fast Charging Infrastructure for Electrifying Road Trips to and from National Parks in the Western United States

This study investigated the fast-charging infrastructure needed by 2030 to enable seamless electrified road trips to and from national parks and monuments in seven western states: Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and Arizona. It also estimated impacts to the electric grid. The research team investigated how on-route charging infrastructure projections change with different parameters or assumptions, as do related charging loads and grid impacts. NREL conducted the study in partnership with utility service provider PacifiCorp and Utah State University as part of the Western Smart Regional EV Adoption and Infrastructure at Scale project.

ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS,ENERGY PLANNING, POLIC↗
DOE OSTI2021

Assessment of Technologies for Improving Light-Duty Vehicle Fuel Economy—2025-2035

From daily commutes to cross-country road trips, millions of light-duty vehicles are on the road every day. The transportation sector is one of the United States’ largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions, and fuel is an important cost for drivers. The period from 2025-2035 could bring the most fundamental transformation in the 100-plus year history of the automobile. Battery electric vehicle costs are likely to fall and reach parity with internal combustion engine vehicles. New generations of fuel cell vehicles will be produced. Connected and automated vehicle technologies will become more common, including likely deployment of some fully automated vehicles. These new categories of vehicles will for the first time assume a major portion of new vehicle sales, while internal combustion engine vehicles with improved powertrain, design, and aerodynamics will continue to be an important part of new vehicle sales and fuel economy improvement.This study is a technical evaluation of the potential for internal combustion engine, hybrid, battery electric, fuel cell, nonpowertrain, and connected and automated vehicle technologies to contribute to efficiency in 2025-2035. In addition to making findings and recommendations related to technology cost and capabilities, Assessment of Technologies for Improving Light-Duty Vehicle Fuel Economy - 2025-2035 considers the impacts of changes in consumer behavior and regulatory regimes.

MARCHANT, GARY↗
DOE OSTI2022

Multi-modal Energy-optimal Trip Scheduling in Real-time (METS-R) for Transportation Hubs (Final Report)

This report summarizes the work performed under the award number EE0008524. The project develops the Multi-modal Energy-optimal Trip Scheduling in Real-time (METS-R) platform as the next-generation transportation solution based on autonomous electric vehicles (AEV) serving passenger trips from and to urban transportation hubs, to substantially reduce transportation energy consumption. Extensive data collection and analyses were first conducted to understand the demand patterns and energy consumption of hub-based on-road trips. Then, a data-driven framework that consists of an analytical module and a simulation module was proposed. For the analytical module, five planning + operation tools were developed to support the planning and energy-efficient operations of urban AEV services: the charging station planning that robotically allocates charging supplies based on the stationary charging demand distribution; the transit planning and demand adaptive scheduling model that efficiently generates\ candidate transit routes from hubs to other places and dynamically adjusts the transit time table to fit the current demand; the online energy-efficient routing that learns the energy-optimal paths from observations of link-level energy consumption in real-time; the hub-based ridesharing that matches trip requests together with account for the uncertainty of future trip demand and vehicle supply; and finally, the integrated demand prediction and anomaly detection pipeline that leverages the flight/train time table and support other planning/operation tools. To demonstrate the performance of these tools, a scalable high-performance agent-based simulator was built. We divided the urban space into multiple service zones where each zone was considered as an agent for passenger generation and vehicle charging. Two types of AEV agents were coded to model two types of mobility services: AEV taxi and AEV transit. For the AEV taxi, the team implemented the functions of pickup/drop-off passengers, energy-efficient routing, ridesharing, fleet rebalancing, and recharging. For the AEV bus, the team implemented the functions of demand-adaptive route scheduling, passenger boarding, and recharging. A high-performance computing framework was introduced to receive various profiling information (such as link energy updates, vehicle speed) from the simulator instances and communicate the operational commands back to the instances. The numerical experiments show that each of the proposed operational algorithms can reduce energy consumption and improve system efficiency. Furthermore, there exists the need to collectively consider multiple planning + operational strategies as multiple strategies can influence each other in terms of performance impacts. Recommendations for future work related to AEV planning and simulation are discussed.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗
DOE OSTI2022

Spark Squad Comic Book: Volume 2 - Hydropower

Join the Spark Squad on a road trip to learn about hydropower! They'll learn how it works and meet people who work various jobs in hydropower.

hydropower, kids, comic book, Energy Saver↗
DOE OSTI2023

The 2030 National Charging Network: Estimating U.S. Light-Duty Demand for Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure; A Nationwide Assessment

Ambitious federal clean goals, along with historic investment in American manufacturing, have put the United States on track to see 30-42 million light-duty electric vehicles (EVs) on the road by 2030. Now, a groundbreaking study from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has estimated the EV charging infrastructure needed nationwide to support a sweeping transition to electrified transportation. The study, titled "The 2030 National Charging Network: Estimating U.S. Light-Duty Demand for Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure," estimates the number, type, and location of the chargers needed to create a comprehensive network of EV charging infrastructure. Its use of proprietary NREL software tools and sophisticated analysis have resulted in a nationwide infrastructure needs assessment with a never-before-seen level of detail - one that takes into account the different ways Americans travel, from running errands to taking road trips, and can adjust to changing circumstances as EV adoption rates change over time.

ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS,ENERGY PLANNING, POLIC↗
DOE OSTI2025

Exploring urban typologies using comprehensive analysis of transportation dynamics

Abstract As urban areas continue to expand and develop, categorizing cities into typologies offers a valuable framework for understanding metropolitan dynamics and fostering inter-city collaboration. However, existing typologies related to urban mobility have limitations, failing to consider cities within a single large urban region and often overlooking crucial dimensions such as trip demand and traffic flow. In this paper, we introduce a transportation-focused characterization for cities within a large urban region, specifically the San Francisco Bay Area, California. We incorporate over 40 metrics across five transportation dimensions: trip demand, road network, multi-modal network, traffic flow, and land use. Specifically, for the trip demand dimension, we include metrics capturing residents’ trip characteristics, such as mode share, intra-city trips, and inter-city trips. Additionally, we analyze the purpose of trips entering the city to gain a deeper understanding of incoming trip patterns. In the traffic flow dimension, we examine metrics like vehicle miles traveled, delay, and congestion to assess the traffic conditions on the street network. These, combined with other dimensions, provide a comprehensive view of a city’s transportation dynamics. Using unsupervised machine learning clustering methods, we identified eight distinct typologies for the Bay Area: Live Work Cities; Job and Activity Magnet Cities; Anchor Cities; Multi-modal Cities; Hyper-connected Cities; Low-density Residential Cities; Medium-density Residential Cities; and Mixed-use Residential Cities. Our findings show that many clusters are strongly influenced by trip demand and traffic flow metrics. Finally, we examine the practicality of this typology and its potential to guide collaborative transportation management strategies. The typologies provide a foundation for dialogue among Bay Area cities, focusing on evaluating shared characteristics and leveraging successes or challenges to develop unified strategies for transportation management.

Kuncheria, Anu↗
DOE OSTI2021

Vibration of a cryomodule’s coupler during road transportation: Multibody analysis and experimental validation

The road transportation of critical components for cryogenic cryomodules is a challenging task. Indeed, the shipping and the handling of fundamental sub-assemblies can expose these components to harmful dynamic loads that can jeopardize their structural integrity. This article has the purpose of developing a finite element multibody model capable of assessing the acceleration on a test coupler for a cavity of the Single Spoke Resonator 1 subjected to a typical road transportation trip. A multibody model consisting of rigid bodies and finite element–imported flexible bodies has been created allowing a comparison of the simulated and experimental acceleration. Afterwards, an experimental on-road test, whose set-up is described in this article, has been carried out at Fermilab with instrumented components. Being able to effectively simulate and validate the dynamic effects on such sub-assemblies makes it possible, for the future, to simulate more complex structures subject to dynamic loadings, such as the entire cryomodules during shipping. Furthermore, the results from the simulations can be used to guide the design of new suspension systems suitable for the reduction mitigation of structural vibration during the road transportation of cryomodules.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2025

2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study

# 2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study The 2003 Vehicle Trip-Length Study focused on Interstate 595 between Davie Road and University Drive in Florida. Survey participants answered questions about their trip's origin and destination—including the type of location such as work, home, store, etc.—the on- and off-ramps used, how many people were in the car, and the type of vehicle. The survey also collected household demographic data such as annual household income, available vehicles, the number of people living in their household, and the number of workers in their household above the age of 16. It also asked if they would use proposed bus-only lanes or train service along the corridor, if available. ## Data Collection Agency The survey was conducted by and for the Florida Department of Transportation. ## Survey Methodology The survey was conducted via mail and online in March 2003. ## Survey Records, Data, and Documentation Survey records include 7,917 participants. Origin and destination locations include street addresses, nearest intersections or landmarks, city, state, zip code, and latitude/longitude.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2025

2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study

# 2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study The 2003 Vehicle Trip-Length Study focused on Interstate 595 between Davie Road and University Drive in Florida. Survey participants answered questions about their trip's origin and destination—including the type of location such as work, home, store, etc.—the on- and off-ramps used, how many people were in the car, and the type of vehicle. The survey also collected household demographic data such as annual household income, available vehicles, the number of people living in their household, and the number of workers in their household above the age of 16. It also asked if they would use proposed bus-only lanes or train service along the corridor, if available. ## Data Collection Agency The survey was conducted by and for the Florida Department of Transportation. ## Survey Methodology The survey was conducted via mail and online in March 2003. ## Survey Records, Data, and Documentation Survey records include 7,917 participants. Origin and destination locations include street addresses, nearest intersections or landmarks, city, state, zip code, and latitude/longitude.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2025

2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study

# 2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study The 2003 Vehicle Trip-Length Study focused on Interstate 595 between Davie Road and University Drive in Florida. Survey participants answered questions about their trip's origin and destination—including the type of location such as work, home, store, etc.—the on- and off-ramps used, how many people were in the car, and the type of vehicle. The survey also collected household demographic data such as annual household income, available vehicles, the number of people living in their household, and the number of workers in their household above the age of 16. It also asked if they would use proposed bus-only lanes or train service along the corridor, if available. ## Data Collection Agency The survey was conducted by and for the Florida Department of Transportation. ## Survey Methodology The survey was conducted via mail and online in March 2003. ## Survey Records, Data, and Documentation Survey records include 7,917 participants. Origin and destination locations include street addresses, nearest intersections or landmarks, city, state, zip code, and latitude/longitude.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2025

2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study

# 2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study The 2003 Vehicle Trip-Length Study focused on Interstate 595 between Davie Road and University Drive in Florida. Survey participants answered questions about their trip's origin and destination—including the type of location such as work, home, store, etc.—the on- and off-ramps used, how many people were in the car, and the type of vehicle. The survey also collected household demographic data such as annual household income, available vehicles, the number of people living in their household, and the number of workers in their household above the age of 16. It also asked if they would use proposed bus-only lanes or train service along the corridor, if available. ## Data Collection Agency The survey was conducted by and for the Florida Department of Transportation. ## Survey Methodology The survey was conducted via mail and online in March 2003. ## Survey Records, Data, and Documentation Survey records include 7,917 participants. Origin and destination locations include street addresses, nearest intersections or landmarks, city, state, zip code, and latitude/longitude.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2025

2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study

# 2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study The 2003 Vehicle Trip-Length Study focused on Interstate 595 between Davie Road and University Drive in Florida. Survey participants answered questions about their trip's origin and destination—including the type of location such as work, home, store, etc.—the on- and off-ramps used, how many people were in the car, and the type of vehicle. The survey also collected household demographic data such as annual household income, available vehicles, the number of people living in their household, and the number of workers in their household above the age of 16. It also asked if they would use proposed bus-only lanes or train service along the corridor, if available. ## Data Collection Agency The survey was conducted by and for the Florida Department of Transportation. ## Survey Methodology The survey was conducted via mail and online in March 2003. ## Survey Records, Data, and Documentation Survey records include 7,917 participants. Origin and destination locations include street addresses, nearest intersections or landmarks, city, state, zip code, and latitude/longitude.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2025

2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study

# 2003 Interstate 595 Vehicle Trip-Length Study The 2003 Vehicle Trip-Length Study focused on Interstate 595 between Davie Road and University Drive in Florida. Survey participants answered questions about their trip's origin and destination—including the type of location such as work, home, store, etc.—the on- and off-ramps used, how many people were in the car, and the type of vehicle. The survey also collected household demographic data such as annual household income, available vehicles, the number of people living in their household, and the number of workers in their household above the age of 16. It also asked if they would use proposed bus-only lanes or train service along the corridor, if available. ## Data Collection Agency The survey was conducted by and for the Florida Department of Transportation. ## Survey Methodology The survey was conducted via mail and online in March 2003. ## Survey Records, Data, and Documentation Survey records include 7,917 participants. Origin and destination locations include street addresses, nearest intersections or landmarks, city, state, zip code, and latitude/longitude.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗