Electric Mobility

Electric Vehicles and Long Distance Travels with Shell Recharge

Find out which Shell Eco-marathon teams won the Pitch the Future challenges with their innovative ideas and watch the virtual awards ceremony.

Meet the winners and watch the awards

When Colin Furze met Roger Hunter

Title: SHELL SEM PARTNER IV 2 OFFLLINE V5

Duration: 3:21 minutes

Description:

Pitch the Future is an all-new virtual competition that challenges Shell Eco-marathon teams from around the world to tackle four real-world energy challenges.

Colin Furze, YouTuber and inventor, interviews Roger Hunter, Vice-President of E-Mobility at Shell, on the topics of long-distance travel with electric vehicles, electric mobility and what he would hope to see from the Eco-marathon teams.

[Background music plays]

Rhythmic, upbeat music.

[Animation]

Turquoise background. From the top of the screen slides a small blue-and-grey concept vehicle on a yellow bar that loops around the Shell pecten, with a grey bar above it. A light-blue bar rises simultaneously from the bottom of the screen. Text and graphics disappear in a rapid blur at the top of the screen.

[Graphic]

Shell Pecten centred on top half of the screen, in a loop in the yellow road.

[Text displays]

Pitch the Future

Hashtag, MakeTheFuture

Hashtag, ShellEcoMarathon

[Animation]

Two blocks of text appear to slide down out of the middle of the blue dotted background. Two curved layers of yellow, blue, light-blue and grey bars slide into view simultaneously in top left and bottom right of screen. Each of the bottom layers has a small concept vehicle on it. Some of the text is contained within a thin white frame. The two blocks of text whoosh off in opposite directions of the screen, top and bottom, leaving the rest of the background behind.

[Graphic]

A small Shell pecten alongside text

[Text displays]

When Colin met Roger Hunter

Shell Recharge

Long Distance Travel with Electric Vehicles

[Video footage]

A video inset of a video-call screen showing the participants, Colin Furze and Roger Hunter, centred on the blue, dotted background. Colin Furze is calling from a workshop or garage, and Roger Hunter is in a home office.

[Text displays]

Colin Furze, YouTuber and Inventor

Roger Hunter, Vice-President E-Mobility

[Video footage]

The screen is momentarily scrambled. When it clears, there are two separate video insets of video-call screens of Colin Furze and Roger Hunter centred on the blue, dotted background.

[Colin Furze]

Hello, Roger. Thanks for joining me. If you want to kind of tell everyone your description, your job description, and what you do.

[Roger Hunter]

Sure. Hi, Colin, yes. So I’m Roger Hunter. I work in the Shell New Energies Team.

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Roger Hunter’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background.

[Roger Hunter]

And I lead the Electric Mobility team.

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Colin Furze’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background.

[Colin Furze]

One of the challenges, of course, in the Pitch the Future is how to optimise, like, long-distance travel with electric vehicles.

[Video footage]

Two separate video insets of video-call screens of Colin Furze and Roger Hunter centred on the blue, dotted background.

[Colin Furze]

And this is kind of one of the things that we all get hooked about, the whole range anxiety and stuff. So, you know, how important is that, that we solve that?

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Colin Furze’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background.

[Roger Hunter]

Let’s face it, with electric vehicles, it is a major challenge to go a long, long distance.

[Video footage]

Two separate video insets of video-call screens of Colin Furze and Roger Hunter centred on the blue, dotted background.

[Roger Hunter]

This is one of the brilliant things about Eco-marathon, is providing these kind of challenges to, you know, the next generation of leaders and scientists and engineers.

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Roger Hunter’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background.

[Roger Hunter]

And see how they think about this problem. So, yes, I’m looking forward to see what they come up with.

[Video footage]

Two separate video insets of video-call screens of Colin Furze and Roger Hunter centred on the blue, dotted background.

[Colin Furze]

Excellent. So, in terms of doing, like, super-long journeys, if you wanted to cross a continent or something in electric vehicle, is the main challenge the charging? Is it where you’re going to fill it up, or is there other things to consider as well?

[Roger Hunter]

Well, I actually think this would make pretty good TV, to be honest, just taking a road trip, you know, across... It’s a shame we can’t ask the students to do that, you know, go from London all the way to Red Square and actually try it. Because I think you’d hit all sorts of challenges.

[Video footage]

Roger Hunter’s inset video-call screen angles slightly backwards on the left as two video insets appear alongside, one of a close-up of a woman’s hands plugging a charging cable into a vehicle, and the other of a vehicle charge-point sign painted on a road surface.

[Text displays]

All Electric Roadtrip

[Roger Hunter]

There’s lots of different variables, planning a really good route, absolutely figuring out where to charge. These are all going to be critical things for the students to think about.

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Colin Furze’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background. It changes quickly to include Roger Hunter’s video-call screen again.

[Colin Furze]

Okay. So then, Roger, what’s Shell doing in terms of electric mobility in that space?

[Video footage]

Colin Furze’s video-call screen disappears as Roger Hunter’s inset video-call screen angles slightly backwards on the left as a video inset appears alongside. Slow zoom in on the front-end of a vehicle with a charging cable trailing from it. Another video replaces it, a close-up of a charger plugged into a vehicle’s recharge point. A woman rounds the front of the vehicle and unplugs the charger and closes the fuel cover.

[Text displays]

Electric Mobility

[Roger Hunter]

I’m really excited, actually, Colin, about Shell’s moves in electric mobility. We’re selling charge posts. We’re selling charge posts’ hardware and software. We’re offering driver access to over 165,000 public charge posts today across the world. Part of that is actually on our retail sites.

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Roger Hunter’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background. It changes quickly to include Roger Hunter’s video-call screen again.

[Roger Hunter]

Our forecourts today, we’ve got over 500 rapid chargers on over 300 of our forecourts. And it’s about growth. We’re really growing in this area, Colin.

[Video footage]

Two separate video insets of video-call screens of Colin Furze and Roger Hunter centred on the blue, dotted background.

[Colin Furze]

The Eco-marathon teams, what are you hoping to see? What’s the thing that you’d like? Somebody to deliver this wonderful pitch onto your desk. What are you hoping to see?

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Roger Hunter’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background. It changes quickly to include Roger Hunter’s video-call screen again.

[Roger Hunter]

We’ve got to think of it from a consumer-centric point of view, so what’s it really like in terms of the customer journey? How can we take some of the frictions out of that customer journey? How can we make it easy and pleasurable for the customer?

[Video footage]

Two separate video insets of video-call screens of Colin Furze and Roger Hunter centred on the blue, dotted background.

[Roger Hunter]

So maybe thinking a bit wider than just, I’ve got to go from A to B, and what could we do on the way? I’m also interested in how the teams think about technology. I mean, what other technology and innovative sort of digital ideas can we bring in...

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Roger Hunter’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background. It changes quickly to include Roger Hunter’s video-call screen again.

[Roger Hunter]

In order to help establish and improve this quest?

[Video footage]

Single centred video inset of Colin Furze’s video-call screen on the blue, dotted background.

[Colin Furze]

Thanks for your time. Much appreciated. And, yes, good luck to the teams.

[Video footage]

Two separate video insets of video-call screens of Colin Furze and Roger Hunter centred on the blue, dotted background.

[Roger Hunter]

Thanks, Colin. Cheers. Bye.

[Video footage]

The screen is momentarily scrambled.

[Audio]

Shell jingle

[Graphic]

Shell Pecten centred on a white background

[Text displays]

Overview

The widespread adoption of electric vehicles will play a critical role in reducing global emissions, offering a route to lower carbon mobility for people and businesses alike. However, there still remains several obstacles to overcome before some consumers are won over.

To address customer anxieties around electric vehicle range, Shell is investing in a range of options to increase both the number of charging points and speed of charging. As well as charging points, battery optimisation will be key to helping address anxieties about electric vehicle range.

Objective

The challenge for students is to plan an all-electric drive from one of three options, depending on their region:

From Buckingham Palace (London, UK) to Red Square (Moscow, RU).
From Wat Arun (Bangkok, TH) to Yu Garden (Shanghai, CN).
From Sugarloaf Mountain (Rio de Janeiro, BR) to CN Tower (Toronto, CAN).*

Teams should work to identify the route that would require the lowest number of stops and allow them to complete the journey in the fastest time possible, while considering how they could optimise their battery to improve range and speed of charging.

*The routes are not comparable in terms of time and number of charging points. The submission was judged on the way teams thought about the route and solution and not on the finite number of stops and speed taken. The different regional routes were not directly compared against each other.