As part of Malta’s National
Climate Change and Energy 2020 targets, 10% of all land transport fuels would
have to come from Renewable Energy Sources. Transport Malta together with the
Ministry for Transport and Infrastructure is actively working to demonstrate
carbon neutral transportation through the use of Solar Energy. As
part of the PORT-PVEV project, three solar charging stations shall be installed
within the Valletta Grand Harbour area and the Ċirkewwa port area. The
car charging stations are tent-like structures covered in photovoltaic panels and
connected directly to a charging system. Batteries on site will store the
energy generated in order for same energy to be used to charge vehicles parked
underneath the structures. Excess energy will be fed into the grid.
The structure, therefore, will be capable of sustaining a
photovoltaic system capable of direct photovoltaic car charging.
These structures are of different
sizes. Structures accommodating simultaneous car charging of four Electric
Vehicles will be located at the Ċirkewwa Malta-Gozo
Ferry Terminal car park and at the Deep Water Quay car park. In addition three structures accommodating the
charging of one Electric Vehicle at a time will be installed at Ta’ Xbiex
Marina.
This project action is being led by the
Ministry for Transport and Infrastructure who are also partners to the
PORT-PVEV project. A tender for the design, supply, delivery,
installation, testing and commissioning of the system has been published at the
beginning of 2014. The structures are scheduled to be installed and
operational by September 2014 in time for a three-month pilot period between
October and December 2014. During the pilot, the use of the solar charging
stations will be demonstrated. Data will be collected and analysed with
the main aim of testing whether
carbon neutral transport can be achieved using Malta’s most ample recourse:
solar power. This pilot action will be a main contributor to the PORT-PVEV
overall objective which is to decouple economic growth from carbon emissions by improving energy efficiency in port
operations.
As part of the same project, similar
structures will also be installed at the Catania port area. Their use here
will be different however. In Catania, the solar charging stations will
be stand-alone structures used to house and re-charge 20 pedelacs to be
purchased and demonstrated as part of the PORT-PVEV project.
In parallel to this project,
the MTI led DEMO-EV Project is also testing carbon neutral transportation by
assigning a number of Battery Electric Vehicles for trials and testing to
a number of individuals who have solar PV panels installed at their residence.
This followed the publication of a Call for Volunteers targeting individuals
and companies interested in participating in this project. The project is
near its completion and the respective data will be available to the project
partners over the coming few months
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