The new electric vehicle rebuilt by the students of the 1st Technical and Vocational Education and Training School of Nicosia (A' TESEK Nicosia), was presented today at an event in the presence of the Minister of Transport, Communications and Works, Mr. The reconstruction of the retro car (antique) and its conversion into an electric car is an initiative of A' TESEK Nicosia and was completed with the support of the Ministry of Transport, Communications and Works, which provided a grant of €25,000.
As part of encouraging students to develop their skills, under the guidance of their teachers, students from various disciplines of the Nicosia A' TESEC Nicosia reconstructed and converted a retro 1971 VW Beatle car into an electronic one.
To carry out the project, the systems and the necessary body parts of the vehicle were designed using a computer, which were entirely reconstructed in the School's laboratories by the students. In addition, modern technologies, such as Computerized Numerical Control (CNC), safety systems, lighting, air conditioning, etc., using Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC), as well as modern safety and protection systems SRS (Supplementary Restraint System), such as ABS, cameras and parking sensors, were applied.
Speaking at the vehicle launch event, Minister of Transport, Communications and Works Yannis Karousos referred to the results of the EU Council of Environment Ministers held on 28 June 2022 in Luxembourg, with the participation of the Ministers of Transport and Environment. According to Mr. Karousos, the Council concluded the discussion on the Fit for 55 legislative package, which set the target for a 55% reduction of pollutants by 2030 and climate neutrality of the Union by 2050.
Furthermore, the Council decided that from 2035 onwards, only zero-emission vehicles will be sold in the European Union, a decision with which Cyprus' national targets are in line.
In particular, and with the aim of reducing pollutants from transport, the Ministry of Transport, Communications and Works is developing various actions to promote the use of electric vehicles. "Our national target is that by 2030, 25% of new vehicle registrations will be electric and by 2035, this percentage will reach 100%," Karousos said. For this purpose, within the framework of the Recovery and Resilience Plan "Cyprus_Tomorrow", the Grant Scheme for the Purchase of Electric Vehicles with a budget of €30 million, the Scheme for the Decommissioning of Old Hazardous Vehicles with a budget of €15 million are being implemented, and the creation of 1,000 recharging stations in public places with a budget of €4 million. "For both Schemes we had about 8,000 applications for both Schemes, which means that about 1% of the population of Cyprus said that if they get the grant they are ready to buy either a zero or low emission car," he said.
The initiative of the A' TESEK Nicosia, the Minister continued, takes on greater significance as it was implemented by teenagers who will very soon be the new users of the road network. With this initiative, they demonstrate that they understand and share the trend that has emerged in recent years for a shift to more environmentally friendly modes of transport. "Education has an important role to play in all this effort and I am happy to see schools, principals, teachers and students joining us in this effort and sending a message that we can be part of the solution and not part of the problem," Karousos stressed. He added that the Ministry immediately responded to the request of the Technical School to contribute financially to the implementation of the initiative.
The Transport Minister congratulated the students for the effort they made and the excellent work they did and conveyed the wish that in the future we will be able to build electric cars in Cyprus as well. In order to make this possible, Karousos said, we need the right culture and education. He noted that in the future, the dominant profession in the transport sector will be electric vehicle engineers. "Everything will change in the future, even petrol stations, since now, instead of refuelling vehicles with conventional fuels, we will have to charge the vehicle and we will have to wait for it to charge for a long time. The stereotypical way in which we have learned to live in terms of transport is completely changing," the Minister explained.
For his part, the Director of the 1st TESEK Nicosia, Mr. Polis Yiannakas, spoke about the original action of the school's children, noting the hard work done by the students and their teachers, which paid off. She said that the Nicosia A' TESEK is being upgraded and promises to be present with important projects that will respond to the policies of the Ministry of Education and the Government in general.
On behalf of the group of students who worked on the project, Dimitris Christofi and Anna Maria Koula, speaking about their experience, described it as unique and unforgettable. They highlighted their collaboration with their teachers and the benefits they gained from the study and the process of reconstructing and converting the vehicle into an electric one. There were, as Dimitris and Anna Maria mentioned, difficult steps in the whole process, such as wiring and plugging and required many hours of work. However, they were very happy to have had the opportunity to participate in the project.
The engineering details and how to handle the different phases of the project were explained by Mr. Marios Hadjikypris, Assistant Director of Automotive Engineering.
(MKy)
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