NSF Engineering Research Center for Advancing Self Sufficiency through Powered Infrastructure for Roadway Electrification (ASPIRE)

Utah State University, Logan UT

Investigators

Abstract

Vehicles drive our national economy. In the U.S. alone, they transport more than 11 billion tons of freight and travel over 3 trillion miles per year. However, economic risks tied to energy costs, infrastructure needs, and national competitiveness underscore the urgent need for innovation in transportation systems. Electrification offers a powerful path forward, but achieving viable solutions at scale will require resolving significant barriers. The NSF ASPIRE Engineering Research Center takes a holistic approach to eliminate range and charging as barriers by developing and deploying a national model for electrification. Technology solutions include advanced concepts for the charging stations of the future, electrified roadways, and AI-driven intelligent transportation and electric utility networks. These innovations support smaller and longer-lasting vehicle batteries, effectively unlimited EV range, and a seamless and reliable charging experience. As technologies advance from pilots to deployments, the cost to move people and goods in the nation will be dramatically reduced, electric utility networks will become more efficient, robust and secure, and local economies will be strengthened with growth in domestic energy production and electricity generation. The NSF ASPIRE ERC is founded on a comprehensive program to achieve convergence and deep integration across disciplines. Strategic planning is led by Center-wide pillars in Research, Electrification Workforce Development and a robust Innovation Ecosystem. This collaborative and immersive approach drives positive national impacts by catalyzing transformations across the transportation, automotive, and electric utility markets. The ASPIRE team and its influence will be central to infusing new technology and preparing for a future of autonomous and electric fleets as the nation invests to rebuild its aging roads and electric utility infrastructure. ASPIRE's unique strength lies in its convergence of expertise across engineering, data science and artificial intelligence, security, and economics. With seamless integration of wireless and wired charging, ASPIRE targets an integrated systems-of-systems approach to co-optimize transportation and electric utility systems and end-user experience and productivity, allowing significant departure from conventional thinking. Through this approach, the Center advances technologies and policies to integrate electrified transportation with the grid — addressing both today’s challenges and those on the horizon. Efforts occur at the nexus of electrical-mechanical-thermal design of vehicles, charging systems, pavements, and power systems, data fusion and dynamic optimization of networked and co-dependent systems, econometrics, policy, and user acceptance. New fundamental insights are continually explored through methods and materials to integrate charging infrastructure into long-life pavements, even as the foundational knowledge of the Center’s early efforts are demonstrated through pilots and real-world deployments. New data science innovations in solving large-scale, nonlinear, nonconvex, and NP-hard problems in offline and real-time settings will have significant impact on systems design and optimization. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.