Advanced Clean Energy Vehicle Project in Japan

摘要

The Advanced Clean Energy Vehicle Project (ACE Project) has been initiated to develop the vehicles which can utilize oil-alternative and clean fuels and achieve twice the energy efficiency of conventional vehicles. To achieve the project objectives, Japanese automobile manufactures are developing six types of hybrid electric vehicles. Those are two passenger cars, two 2t-cargo trucks, and two city buses. Technologies of the developing vehicles include many kinds of hybrid elements, such as series and series/parallel hybrid types, Otto and Diesel cycle internal combustion engines using alternative fuels (natural gas, dimethyl ether), a reformed methanol fuel cell, as well as flywheels, ultra-capacitors and lithium-ion batteries.