This e-rickshaw Is Powered By Audi
It, and two others like it, are part of a study on reusing battery modules after they are done serving cars.
One can easily spot autorickshaws, e-rickshaws, trucks and even last-mile delivery vans with fake brand logos in India. There was one that I was following the other day – an autorickshaw with an Audi logo at the back. Misleading that may be, but I personally find such stints adorable and aspirational at the same time.
And I apologise. That story has nothing to do with what you see here. The only reason I blabbered all that is because I wanted to deliver a punchy title. All photographs in this story are of an e-rickshaw powered by Audi and aren’t fake. The Audi logo denotes that it has batteries from an e-tron. More specifically, they are from the test fleet vehicles.
The product is from a German-Indian start-up, Nunam. It, and two others like it, are part of a study on reusing battery modules after they are done serving cars. In other words, a second-life use. The organisation, which has roots in Bengaluru and Berlin, will provide these e-rickshaws to women. They can, for instance, use them to transport goods to a market for sale. The idea is simple: to help strengthen their job opportunities in India.
Nunam has built these three prototypes in collaboration with the training team at Audi’s Neckarsulm site. In fact, this is the first joint project between Audi AG and the Audi Environmental Foundation, in addition to the start-up. Numan’s primary goal is to explore and engineer ways to use old batteries as second-life power storage systems.
That’s not all, as the organisation also aims to help India reduce its dependence on fossil fuels. The e-rickshaws can also be charged using power from solar charging stations, thus ridding their complete reliance on those being fed by coal-sourced electricity. Nunam has made all the data available to potential imitators on an open-source platform. The aim is simple here: to encourage other players to develop products with second-life components.
As part of a pilot project, the e-rickshaws designed by Nunam will hit the Indian roads in early 2023. Apart from those, there’s an additional e-rickshaw being developed by Nunam. That will travel to Berlin and feature in the Greentech Festival from June 22, 2022. Visitors will also be allowed to take it for a spin.
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