A General Motors representative presented a check to West Virginia Universitys EcoCAR team Friday (Sept. 19) to help kick off the three-year competition to engineer a more fuel-efficient sport utility vehicle.

Christopher Trush, the WVU teams mentor from GM, visited the team and brought along a check for $10,000 in seed money to help fund their first-year efforts.

The seed funds will help fund the design and simulation during the first year of the competition, said Scott Wayne , professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and the teams adviser.

EcoCAR: The NeXt Challenge is a national three-year collegiate competition sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy , Argonne National Labs and GM. Its purpose is to give students hands-on experience designing vehicles to be more fuel-efficient, with reduced greenhouse-gas emissions, while maintaining performance and reliability.

Over the next three years, the WVU team will convert a stock 2009 Saturn Vue crossover sport utility vehicle into an advanced-technology hybrid vehicle that is more economical to operate and more environmentally friendly.

In the first year of the competition, students will explore different design options with the use of special software. In the second year, the team will receive a vehicle from GM and begin integrating new parts, testing emissions and fuel efficiency, and making structural changes. The third and final year will be devoted to making additional improvements, working on appeal and marketability and getting the vehicle ready for production.

WVU s EcoCAR team is composed mainly of mechanical and aerospace engineering majors, along with students from computer science and electrical engineering .

More on the Net: www.ecocarchallenge.org