Who is new in the world of electric vehicles?

This is Sion from Sono Motors

The Sion is a very special car. In my opinion it is what many little children think of when they are playing. The idea is simple, the implementation most likely rather not. If you have an electric car there is at some point the urgent need to charge your batteries, in Germany this is called range anxiety (Reichweitenangst). That can take 20 minutes for 80% with fast-charging or take hours at the normal outlet of one's home. But just imagine your car would be charge at any daylight time while parking outside. Sounds crazy? How about the charge is free? Impossible!

Not quite! The main advantage of Sono Motors' Sion are the 7.5 square meters of solar panels that cover the outside body of the car, which charges the batteries up anytime the car is parked outside. Every day it will gives you an extra charge of averaged 30 kilometers a day. Most people drive an average of 50 kilometers a day, so you can imagine that most people using this car, which is designed for urban purposes, will drive to work for free or at least very, very cheap.
Sono Motors is a small, young, crowdfunded start-up from Munich in Germany. They created their car in a long developement process in their own garage and put a lot of lifeblood into their work. Starting at 12.000€, with a clear and nice design this car is a real newcomer on the EV market. The Urban version will go for 120 km in one charge and the Extender up to 250 km.
But it is not only designed for driving to work or the grocerystore, the Sion is an adventurer. With his trailer hitch it is strong enough to explore the nature and pull a caravan at the same time. While your are enjoying the outside the Sion will charge his battery for you and all your electric devices. You will be free in nature but stay connected to anything you fell like connecting to.
Test drives start in mid 2017.
Furthermore, reSono will be launched. It is an easy to use repair service, where Sono Motors will send you spare parts and anyone can build them in with online videos. That saves carbon emissions and money for the costumer.

In my opinion this is an awesome idea made by real visionairs. The car is perfect for urban areas, determined by size and range. The daily free charge is a real game changer for people who are afraid they will strand somewhere without energy in the battery. For the city of Alcoi this is a fantastic solution. Alcoi is not very big so the range is definitley enough, for the Extender it is even enough for a trip to Valencia and back. The Spanish sun will make the final point for my argument.

https://www.sonomotors.com/

- Lennart

Meeting with a delegation of Alcoi on 25th October

Today we had a very productive meeting with a delegation from the University in Alcoi and Erlijn our mentor. We talked about our stay in Spain in January, we got offered a lot of support concerning housing, workspaces and more. Furthermore, we presented the product of our previous brainstorming session. We used the methodology of the "idea tree" in order to brainstorm precisely and cluster our ideas at the same time. The result will be uploaded here as well.

Our group also learned more about our assignment and the existing infrastructure in Alcoi. The city has many bridges and narrow streets which make it difficult for cars to navigate through the city and leads to traffic jams. Alcoi also has very big differences in altitudes, so if we want to promote bicycle use as a way of transportation instead of recreational usage, then we have to come up with a creative concept to change the behavior of the people.

Instead of always increasing the amount of parking spaces, one idea could be decreasing them and making them more expensive. People will make better choices if driving a car becomes more and more inconvenient and more sustainable choices are offered.

We were asked to think outside the box when coming up with ideas and that is what we will do. This meeting ensured us that it will be an interesting project and we will have a good cooperation with the team from Alcoi.

Project meeting 30.9.

Quick update from last Friday! We had important Skype meeting with our Spanish client in the afternoon and before that we got together with the group. At first we checked what we have already done and after that we moved to upcoming assignments, divided the work and prepared questions for Skype meeting.

After some technical difficulties the Skype was success. We got a lot of new information about the project which helps us to understand the assignment better. Almost all of our questions were answered and now it is easier to continue working among the project. After the Skype call we discussed our thoughts about the assignment and everyone was quite satisfied with current situation. We finally came up with a team name and since last Friday we have been the Sustainable Seven! Team introduction can be read below this post. Our contact from Spain also confirmed our travel dates so now we can book our flights or trains to Alicante, yay!