FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo.— Thanks to the latest delivery at the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center's (ERDC) Contingency Basing Integration Training and Evaluation Center (CBITEC), the push to electrify the battlefield is one step closer.
Volcon ePowersports delivered their all-electric Stag Utility Terrain Vehicle (UTV) to ERDC's Construction Engineering Research Laboratory (CERL) CBITEC facility located at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. This milestone marks the first-ever delivery of a Stag UTV to ERDC, in line with the Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) between ERDC and Volcon.
Through the collaboration fostered by the CRADA, CERL and Volcon are working jointly on research and development efforts aimed at enhancing the capabilities of electric vehicles, with a focus on creating dual-use products that benefit both warfighters and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in their support of emergency services disaster response. CBITEC is providing the space to exercise ERDC’s first Stag.
“We will be able to put the all-electric Stag in front of Soldiers and provide feedback to Volcon,” Craig White, CBITEC facility manager, said. “The Operational Energy Team will have the opportunity to collect data and evaluate the power requirements needed to support the equipment and the Soldier as we move forward electrifying the battlefield.”
The Stag's delivery is supporting government fleet electrification from the current day through 2050. This collaboration supports the objective outlined in the 2022 U.S. Climate Strategy and Executive Order 14057.
"The move to electrify the battlefield will create new challenges, such as how we recharge electric fleets of vehicles in the field, while still fighting and winning wars,” Tom Decker, CERL's Operational Energy Program Manager, said. "The all-electric Stag provides us the ability to start looking at how charging electric vehicles will impact our tactical electrical grids and then how to scale that problem up to other requirements."
The Volcon Stag will assist with CBITEC's mission of training Soldiers and supporting the role of evaluating technology while being evaluated itself. The Stag will give the CBITEC team the ability to look at large battery recharging impacts to the tactical grids. With potential multiple units, CBITEC will be able to see the impacts of large load changes required while recharging battery and providing power to a base camp.
Volcon will provide technical expertise to improve energy management in electric vehicles like the Stag, including measurement, monitoring, range extension and export power processes and procedures.
Nestled under the BEAM EV ARC™ 2020, the Stag will garner its power from the 100% renewable, transportable, off-grid electric vehicle charging system, when not plugged into the tactical grid for research purposes.