On the 18th of April the first of the ASSURED Talk series was held at the UITP stand at TRA2018 in Vienna. The discussion focused on the ASSURED technological innovations aiming at the successful upscaling of urban commercial fleets. The panel of experts provided useful insights into the technological, operational, and policy-related aspects, as well as on future trends of urban e-fleets in cities to the audience who gathered at the stand.
The Talk was moderated by the ASSURED Coordinator, Noshin Omar (VUB), with Guido Sacchetto (EC RTD), Umberto Guida (UITP), Karen Vancluysen (Secretary General of the Polis Network) and Maria Wedenby Ahlberg (Volvo Bus Corporation) as panelists.
Mr. Sacchetto highlighted the relevance and importance of ASSURED, stating “standardisation and interoperability are the things we need to success. Finally we have a project developing the final step for the integration of electric vehicles into cities, this is one of the pluses of the ASSURED project.”
Umberto Guida stressed how the IT dimension is becoming essential for an efficient e-fleet management, for instance providing real time information on e.g. battery status (SOC levels), easing the charging schedules and timetables of the e-buses.
Maria Wedenby Ahlberg, emphasized the importance of a meaningful cooperation between PTO, PTA and cities, and the role ASSURED will play in rethinking and upscaling electric fleets.
Finally, Karen Vancluysen underlined the core objective of cities to comply with air quality targets and the consequent emerging need of tackling concerns with a cross-sectoral approach.
Following the panel, Maria Wedenby Ahlberg performed a live demonstration of the Volvo e-bus line simulator, placed at the UITP stand, which is based on great part of the ZeEUS project knowledge and experiences, raising high interest among both audience and speakers.
