Winners of the Altair Enlighten Awards 2021 have been announced, featuring some incredible weight reducing technologies and designs that aim to reduce automotive carbon footprints, while also mitigating water and energy consumption, and promoting material reuse and recycling.
Presented in partnership with the Center for Automotive Research (CAR), the Altair Enlighten Awards 2021 recognise the automotive industry’s most impressive sustainable engineering initiatives, focusing on light-weighting and the use of innovative materials, technologies, and techniques to cut CO2 emissions.
“The 2021 Enlighten Award once again shines a light on the inspiring work of automotive engineers worldwide. Now more than ever, sustainability and emissions reduction are critical challenges not just for the automotive sector, but society as a whole,” said Altair CEO James R. Scapa.
“By enabling unprecedented convergence of simulation, data analytics, and high-performance computing, Altair is proud to continue to celebrate and power light-weighting initiatives around the globe as automotive organisations transform pioneering ideas into production-ready solutions more quickly and efficiently.”
Altair Enlighten Awards 2021 winning projects, runners-up, and honourable mentions
Sustainable Product – Vehicle
· Winner: Ford Motor Company, 2021 Ford Mustang Mach-E – The all-electric Ford Mustang Mach-E emits zero CO2 while driving, and its sustainable credentials are further supported by a 100 per cent vegan interior that eliminates the use of animal products.
Sustainable Product – Component
· Winner: Magna International, 2019 RAM 1500 Active Air Deflector and Grille Shutters – Using lightweight, cost-effective, and 78 per cent recyclable plastics, the RAM 1500 Active Air Deflector and Grille Shutters reduce drag by 9 per cent for better fuel economy. Aero products on the RAM 1500 have reduced CO2 emissions by 641.9 thousand metric tons since January of 2015.
· Runner-up: SAIC GM Wuling Automobile Co, Ltd., for the Wuling Victory – To help achieve both lightweighting and safety goals, the Victory design features increased use of high strength steel, ultra-strength steel, and hot forming process on body in white. The whole vehicle weight is reduced by 61.5 kg, enabling an improvement in fuel consumption of 0.2L/100km.
Sustainable Process
· Winner: Faurecia, NAFILean Stiff – NAFILean Stiff is a polypropylene compound that uses 20 per cent bio-sourced contents and is 100 percent recyclable. NAFILean Stiff is the latest innovation of the NAFILean family. Implemented in 17 production vehicles since 2013, the NAFILean Family stands to benefit a fleet of 14 million vehicles. Delivering a 21 per cent reduction in weight, it has offered a savings of 100,000 tons in CO2 emissions (assuming a 10-year lifetime at 15,000km/year for 14 million vehicles), and an additional 811 million km travelled with the same quantity of fuel.
· Runner-up: Henkel, Pallimuna Metal Pretreatment Process – Used in the production of the 2021 Toyota Tacoma and Tundra, Pallimuna provides significant sustainability advantages compared to conventional processes, including eliminating the use of heavy metal phosphates, reducing sludge generation up to 90 per cent, and decreasing the use of water up to 50 per cent.
Lightweighting Enabling Technology
· Winner: ArcelorMittal, Fortiform 980GI Next Generation Steel – Combining high ductility for complex shapes with higher levels of strength for improved safety, Fortiform 980GI offers potential weight savings of up to 20 per cent.
· Runner-up: JAC Group, JAC SOL A5, Fastback Sports Car – JAC Group established an integrated, simulation-driven design process for body structural design. Applying a multi-disciplinary approach that also embraced safety, noise, vibration, harshness (NVH) and durability, a reduction in whole vehicle weight of 106.3 kg was achieved.
· Honorable Mention: U.S. Steel, Body-in-White Assembly using U.S. Steel 980 XG3 Gen3 AHSS – Combining strength and formability without compromising weldability, U.S. Steel 980 XG3TM realises weight savings of approximately 10 per cent with potential improvement in safety performance compared to previous program body in white.
Module Lightweighting
· Winner: Stellantis, 2021 Jeep Grand Cherokee Composite Tunnel Reinforcement (partners: Stellantis, BASF, L&L Products) –The industry-first Jeep Grand Cherokee Composite Tunnel Reinforcement is designed to carry a critical load path and achieves a 40 per cent weight savings on the component itself, and a further 20 percent on the subsystem. The total weight savings per vehicle is 2.08 kg and is combined with lower costs for both the component and initial tooling.
· Runner-up: Rassini Suspensiones, Lightweight Multi-Material Leaf Spring – The Lightweight Multi-Material ‘Hybrid’ Leaf Spring uses GFRP composite materials and HP-RTM manufacturing technology which enables a 30 per cent weight savings over the previous product generation. Because the design is widely applicable to light duty trucks, and medium and heavy commercial vehicles, the potential total annual market is estimated at nine million leaf springs.
Future of Lightweighting
· Winner: American Axle & Manufacturing, Electric Drive Unit (eDU) – AAM’s eDU saves more than 25 per cent in mass compared to similar units on the market. Integrating the electric machine, gearbox, and inverter in a compact package, it also demonstrates a higher power-to-weight ratio than competitor products.
· Runner-up: Shiloh Industries, Aluminum Curvilinear Laser Welded Blank – Representing the industry’s first ever aluminum curvilinear laser welded blank, this one-part, one-stamping solution eliminates four original parts. In a typical liftgate, for example, this results in a 16 percent weight reduction. At 5.3 kg per vehicle, that would mean a total savings of three million kg of aluminium per annum, based on a 300,000-vehicle production volume. In addition, potential cost savings of $18 per vehicle are realized.
· Honorable Mention: Dura Automotive Systems, Dura Modular EV Battery Tray – A modular and scalable design that can be tailored to multiple platforms and vehicles of all types and sizes, the Dura Modular EV Battery Tray delivers a 10 per cent weight savings over the surrogate design and a reduction in CO2 emissions of 3.8 tons over the program life.
