Bengaluru start-up offers a ‘ZEN’ solution to fire risks and low life of EV batteries Premium
The Hindu
The adoption of electric vehicles has been on the rise in India. As per data from the Ministry of Heavy Industries, more than 27 lakh electric vehicles have been registered in the country as of July 2023 with Karnataka seeing the third highest number of registrations.
The adoption of electric vehicles has been on the rise in India. As per data from the Ministry of Heavy Industries, more than 27 lakh electric vehicles have been registered in the country as of July 2023 with Karnataka seeing the third highest number of registrations.
However, incidents of electric vehicles and battery swapping stations catching fire have been a cause of concern to consumers and potential users.
“Over the last year, more than 200 vehicles caught fire in India, primarily due to overcharging and overheating or short circuits. Batteries are not designed to withstand the abuse, and in the scenario where a cell bursts, the whole vehicle catches fire due to improper mitigation,” says Mohammed Shoeb Ali, co-founder and managing partner at Transition VC, an energy transition-focused venture capital fund.
Bengaluru-based startup EMO Energy may have a solution for it. Founded by Sheetanshu Tyagi and Rahul Patel, EMO Energy has developed a platform which combines software, hardware, cloud, and intelligence to improve safety and life of batteries. Called ZEN, the platform targets battery usage in high energy and high-power applications from electric two wheelers to agriculture to mining and construction.
“We realised that all these applications have the same kind of issues. One is safety,” says Mr. Tyagi.
“You are operating in high temperature, and you want batteries that charge fast, pull more power and are smaller in size. And then there’s the concern of life. While vehicles have a life of seven to eight years, every two to three years you are losing a battery,” he adds.
The team put together their heads to understand how they could enhance the performance of batteries and solve the existing problems around it.
Several principals of government and private schools in Delhi on Tuesday said the Directorate of Education (DoE) circular from a day earlier, directing schools to conduct classes in ‘hybrid’ mode, had caused confusion regarding day-to-day operations as they did not know how many students would return to school from Wednesday and how would teachers instruct in two modes — online and in person — at once. The DoE circular on Monday had also stated that the option to “exercise online mode of education, wherever available, shall vest with the students and their guardians”. Several schoolteachers also expressed confusion regarding the DoE order. A government schoolteacher said he was unsure of how to cope with the resumption of physical classes, given that the order directing government offices to ensure that 50% of the employees work from home is still in place. On Monday, the Commission for Air Quality Management in the National Capital Region and Adjoining Areas (CAQM) had, on the orders of the Supreme Court, directed schools in Delhi-NCR to shift classes to the hybrid mode, following which the DoE had issued the circular. The court had urged the Centre’s pollution watchdog to consider restarting physical classes due to many students missing out on the mid-day meals and lacking the necessary means to attend classes online. The CAQM had, on November 20, asked schools in Delhi-NCR to shift to the online mode of teaching.