University of Southampton features in national campaign to highlight value of universities

Universities Week 2014 will be launched on Monday 9 June at the Natural History Museum in London where a week-long public event will showcase some of the best of UK university research.

Researchers from the University of Southampton will join teams from 44 other UK universities represented at the Museum during the week. The exhibition will include research stations, pop-up performances, debates and live research demonstrations, covering a range of research themes.

The University’s Energy Technology Research Group will be highlighting their work on energy management as part of the University’s “Bringing Research to Life” roadshow. They will demonstrate their AC Cobra electric test car and invite the public to run a virtual electric vehicle with their smartphones to help imagine a city of electric cars running off batteries and the electricity grid.

Professor Andy Cruden , Head of the Energy Technology Research Group, says: “Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) is the concept of combining many geographically disparate, grid connected, electric vehicle (EV) batteries, to act as a large scale electrical energy store. V2G offers the lowest cost method of providing grid-scale energy storage, as the battery cost is embedded within the purchase or lease of the electric vehicle itself. Such storage is important to help balance and control the increasing amounts of renewable generation, for example, wind turbines or solar panels, delivering energy to the UK network.”

As well as the week-long exhibition at the Natural History Museum, there will be a range of other activities taking place across the UK as part of Universities Week 2014, to promote and engage the public with the value and importance of university research.