How ION’s platform helped design, power and deploy an all electric excavator to operate in extremely cold temperatures

As the electrification of transport rapidly spread to multiple other industries, the customer felt the need to build sustainable, zero-emission construction machines that could replace the diesel engine completely. They envisioned designing and deploying a range of compact, fully rechargeable clean energy construction equipment. The objectives were to deliver zero exhaust emissions, reduce the noise, pollution, and maintenance requirement, improve efficiency and reduce costs.

Their challenge was to undertake their first electrification project for construction equipment, that would operate under extremely low temperatures (-20 degrees). The success of this project was critical, considering the investment in terms of time and cost. After numerous discussions held internally, they set out to find a partner who could help them power their first, fully electric excavator, within a year.

The powertrain that was needed to build electric construction equipment would significantlyvary from that of a passenger car! Given the challenges and complications of this project, the customer was looking for a partner with the right experience, expertise, and advanced technological capabilities.

After having met with multiple potential partners, who were failing to meet their expectations within the given timelines, they approached ION Energy’s trusted partner who had a strong foundation in developing technology and electronic systems, R&D, and rechargeable battery production. The customer felt confident about setting out on the enormous endeavor of producing their first, commercially viable, electrically powered excavator.

Our partner analyzed multiple complexities and aspects of battery management in low temperatures. The challenge they faced was to identify a smart battery management system provider who would enable a highly scalable and efficient Master and Slave architecture for batteries manufactured by the partner.

They actively started meeting BMS providers across the world who could bring the engineering and technological capability to help materialize this project. Because of the immense growth potential, they were looking for a versatile and reliable partner to help them with the design, control, and deployment of smart BMS for their customer.

They discussed the project with the team at ION and found the team focused on building technologies that essentially improve the life and performance of lithium-ion batteries. They chose ION because of the team’s commitment to building innovative business models, BMS’s typical capabilities like state-of-charge and state-of-health monitoring and cell balancing, coupled with connectivity and data logging, and access to ION’s analytics platform.