NREL Researchers Garner DOE Awards at Annual Merit Review
The U.S. Department of Energy honored two NREL research teams for their outstanding achievements at the Vehicle Technologies Office’s Annual Merit Review and Peer Evaluation Meeting.
Mobility Energy Productivity Metric—Venu Garikapati, Stanley Young, and Yi Hou
David Anderson (second from right), manager of the Vehicle Technologies Office's Energy Efficient Mobility Systems Program, with NREL's Yi Hou (left), Venu Garikapati, and Stanley Young
NREL’s Venu Garikapati, Stanley Young, and Yi Hou received a team award for their creation of the Mobility Energy Productivity (MEP) metric, a new method of quantifying transportation energy, time, cost, and accessibility.
Mobility is one of the fundamental aspects of human behavior, governed by factors such as time, cost, convenience, and availability of travel options. The MEP metric provides an avenue for measuring the quality of mobility at a specific location in its current configuration, as well as assessing how various technological advancements (e.g., connected and automated vehicles, plug-in electric vehicles, shared mobility) and infrastructure investments (e.g., building an additional highway lane; constructing a new shopping mall) impact the mobility of that location over time. A location with high-quality mobility offers multiple transportation options to a diverse number of opportunities while minimizing time, cost, and energy consumption.
Co-Optimization of Fuels and Engines—John Farrell and Bob McCormick
NREL's John Farrell and Bob McCormick
NREL’s John Farrell and Bob McCormick were recognized as part of the multi-lab leadership team that oversees the Co-Optimization of Fuels and Engines initiative. The award honors the team’s groundbreaking work to synergistically improve fuels and engines to maximize fuel economy.
NREL is collaborating with eight other national laboratories, the Department of Energy, and 20 academic and industry partners on this first-of-its-kind initiative. Co-Optima efforts focus on combining biofuels and combustion research and development to simultaneously transform both transportation fuels and vehicles to maximize performance and energy efficiency, minimize environmental impacts, and accelerate widespread adoption while lowering driver’s costs.
Learn More
Each year at the Annual Merit Review, principal investigators leading projects funded by the Vehicle Technologies Office present the status of their projects and provide an overview of their accomplishments. View all the presentations from the 2019 meeting.
Learn more about NREL's transportation research.