A University of Illinois (UIC) Chicago press release reports that a team of university students has successfully built a solar-powered charging station to ensure a campus food truck makes zero-emissions deliveries.

It is not new for students to get involved in research projects within the university, however, students at the university have not only built a prototype or demonstration of a technology fair, they have also presented a truly “eco-friendly” food car.

The solar charging station activates the commercial electric vehicle.

Although the car may not look like a Tesla or a Ford EV, it's pretty much street legal and has a top speed of 25 mph (40 km/h).

Most importantly, the vehicle is an important part of the university's Food Recovery Network (FRN), an initiative that collects leftover food from campus dining halls and delivers it to Chicago's homeless shelters and kitchens.

Clean Technica reported that in 2020, the Food Recovery Network delivered more than 7,500 pounds (3,400 kilograms) of food to shelters in the city.

This helped those in need and saved food from ending up in landfills.

And now, with food delivery that's also shipped in a sustainable way, the whole process is getting greener.

The press release stated that the plan to build a solar-powered charging station for the Food Recovery Network vehicle came from the University's Office of Planning, Sustainability and Project Management.

The office proposed the project to a team of students, 3 students from the Department of Mechanical Engineering, and one from Biomedical Engineering, who accepted the challenge.

The university funded the project, and the team focused on designing and purchasing components for the charging station.

Work on the project began in the fall of 2020 and was halted when the coronavirus hit, and the cargo station's original design was a trailer so it could be more mobile.

But supply chain issues on the automotive sector in general during the pandemic affected this project as well, as the trailer was not delivered despite waiting for 3 months, then the team switched to a fixed system and when the facilities at the university reopened, they assembled the charging station in the machine shop.

With a 300-watt solar panel, the team aims to fully charge the electric car off-grid. The panels charge the battery during the day, then charge it using the battery at night.

To ensure increased panel performance during the day, panels are aligned with the movement of the sun.