We want to inspire to implement sustainability in daily life, by showing what is possible. We do this by traveling all-electric and visiting other sustainable initiatives to learn from.
Why are we going to Africa all-electric?
Climate change is a hot topic.
Traveling both for business and pleasure is changing.
The world is running out of fossil fuels; the most used source for traveling during the last 200 years.
Using fossil fuels for traveling generates a lot of CO2 emissions. The shortage, as well as the pollution, are reasons to look for alternatives.
A world premiere in the travel industry
Something that is never done before, but we believe WE can.
We, Maarten van Pel & Renske Cox, want to show the world what is possible driving an electric car for long distances in extreme circumstances and through countries where electric cars and charging stations are not implemented yet.
To do this we will charge the car with solar panels we take with us.
Electric cars are an alternative
The electric car has a lot of potential. However, the user will have to adapt.
1. It is no longer possible to fuel up in just 5 minutes
2. Fewer kilometers can be driven without a stop.
More and more people are switching to electric, however a lot of them rent a fossil fuel car for long distances traveling.
Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s)
While driving long-distance in an electric car, we will visit all kinds of projects that contribute to these four Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s):
- Affordable and clean energy
- Responsible consumption & Production
- Climate action / Protecting Nature
- Partnership for the goals
We will multiply the four SDG’s above by:
- Fun
- Simple
- Practical
- Ownership.
4 SDG’s x 4 ways to implement them. That is how 4x4electric was born as NGO.
We will share what we learn to inspire on what else could be done at home and at work.
Our goals as NGO
01. Accessibility
Find a way to make sustainable energy accessible off-grid as a mobile package.
At least 51% of our kilometers in Africa will be driven on electricity charged with our mobile charging package from north to south Africa
Drive through 30+ countries, of which many countries have no charging stations, and charge the car with our off-grid mobile charging package.
02.
Trust
Gaining the trust of, and inspiring our followers, companies, and investors on what is possible in making our lives more sustainable.
Reach a public of more than 10 million people international.
Share our story on at least 20 different events in Europe and/or Africa.
03. Opportunity
Offer companies an opportunity to test new techniques that contribute to sustainable mobility. Our collected data and our learnings will be shared with the public.
Invite followers and partners at least 3 times when we are testing our off-grid mobile charging package.
Present our car and mobile charging package on at least 10 different events in Europe and/or Africa.
04.
Learning together
Inviting schools and universities to participate in our project to learn together with us.
At least 1.000 students will work on our project with us.
Share our story on at least 10 schools or universities.
05.
Support people
Support the people/projects we visit by providing our network, knowledge, electricity from our car, and more.
Visit 15 people/projects on route that contribute to sustainability and share what we learn from them with our followers.
At least 5 videos of different sustainable initiatives.
Timeline
We flew to South Africa and drove with a jeep through Namibia and Botswana. We fell in love with the continent but also realized what +0.5degree could do to this nature. We decided our flight back home would be the last one, and do what we can to live sustainably.
We built a bed in our Tesla model 3 and traveled through Scandinavia to experience what it would be like traveling all-electric.
We organized a party in our garden for friends and family. This is when we shared our idea for the first time; to travel long distance all-electric, charging with solar panels we would take with us.
The reactions we received were so positive that we decided to give it a try and see how far we would come.
- Developing a media strategy
- Improving our partner collaboration plan
- Building a dashboard where followers could get live information out of our car during the expedition
We bought the solar panels for the expedition.
We presented at the second exhibition: Huis&Energie
At this moment the students of ZUYD were still working on the data dashboard. We contacted Itility, which resulted in a new partnership. They now take the lead in building and maintaining the dashboard.
With the new look of the car, all our communication was updated as well.
In addition, we worked hard on the preparations of the inside and outside of the car. The system was made and installed to store the 60 solar panels in the car, as well as a fridge, an extra battery and an extra rooftop box. The system to charge the car was finalized.
Customized solar panels were installed on the frunk, rooftop tent and rooftop box. These panels charge the 12V battery of the car to provide the airconditioning, our fridge and for cooking.
In addition, the ground-clearance of the car was increased by replacing the springs.
