Inductively coupled power transfer for continuously powered electric vehicles

Economic and environmental issues are main motivation for developing efficient and sustainable electrical vehicle for urban transportation. Electrical vehicles (EV) have two main advantages compared to hybrid and gasoline vehicle: eliminated tailpipe emissions and simplified drive-train. However, electric vehicles have a limited range between recharges when fitted with the current state-of-the-art energy storage. To mitigate the limitations of the energy storage technology, we propose to use inductively coupled power transfer (ICPT) to supply power to the vehicle while it is moving. ICPT is an efficient technique for transferring power with no physical connection between the source and the load. In this paper we investigate the ICPT requirements for two types of vehicles operating in combination with ICPT system. The first vehicle makes use of a battery as primary and ICPT as secondary energy source for electric vehicle supplying. The goal is to achieve 300 miles range of covering. The second uses electrochemical capacitors (Ultracapacitors) as the power source and ICPT as the energy source. The goal is to provide unlimited range for the vehicle. The result is system analysis of feasibility of battery-ICPT and ultracapacitor-ICPT combinations for different driving conditions and vehicles as well as rough evaluation of expected length and optimal positions of ICPT track for specified driving cycles.