Nottingham City Council are constructing a new wireless charging area for electric taxis.
Wireless Charging of Electric Taxis (WiCET) is a £3.4 million project funded by Office for Zero Emission Vehicles (OZEV) through Innovate UK to assess the commercial and technical viability of deploying wireless charging for electric Hackney Carriages.
Construction has now begun on Trent Street to trial new wireless charging for hackney cabs situated in the rank nearby Nottingham Station.
The WiCET project is a UK first involving both London Electric Vehicle Company (LEVC) and Nissan Dynamo electric taxis, placing Nottingham at the forefront of green technology innovation.
The project is led by Cenex, with partners Coventry University, Hangar-19, Nottingham City Council, Shell Research Limited, Sprint Power and Transport for London, with Lumen Freedom supplying the hardware.
Five wireless charging ground pads are being installed in the coming weeks whilst nine electric and hybrid taxis have been fitted with wireless charging equipment.
Local drivers will be able to use these vehicles to charge wirelessly and provide feedback to the project team to help understand the real-world feasibility of wireless charging and to help develop the technology further. Sign ups are now open for local hackney cab drivers who wish to take part in the trial and receive a free loan of a wireless charging taxi for 30-60 days.
It is hoped that taxi drivers will top up their charge throughout the day while they wait for customers. This will significantly reduce down time spent away from the rank using plug in chargers whilst encouraging the shift to electric taxi adoption to improve local air quality, reduce noise pollution and carbon emissions in the city. The trial is set to start later in the summer 2022.
Images courtesy of Nottingham City Council.
