Army Innovation Day 2021 will focus on energy and environmental resilience as its 'Accelerated Warfare' concept foreshadows greater demand for power.
"As technology proliferates in the modern battlespace, the demand for Power and Energy (P&E) will increase, imposing greater levels of energy dependence for land combat," Defence said. "Army is mindful of balancing operational requirements with effective environmental waste management as part of Defence's ongoing commitment to environmental sustainability.
"As Army seeks to understand and manage its environmental impacts it looks to Industry and Research Institutions to strengthen resource security, improve the efficiency of resource consumption and modernise waste management.
"Defence is seeking innovative proposals that complement and improve the energy and environmental resilience of the deployed Land Force in the following areas: (1) reducing energy consumption and new power technology, and (2) managing waste."
The call for submissions contains two sub-themes: Enhanced Energy Generation, Transfer and Storage; and an alternative waste management system architecture.
Examples of the former include 'significant improvements on current energy storage density solutions (10 fold+)' and the 'reduction of the size and weight of current energy storage devices for robotics and autonomous systems by 50 per cent of current physical volumes.'
Examples of the latter include ways to 'reduce, reuse and/or recycle operational waste and by-products to minimise environmental pollution and contamination' and 'harness in-situ operational waste products for energy generation.'
More information is available here.