BUILT FOR A ROOF THAT MOVES One major U.S. ambulance service showed how high the stakes could be. Across thousands of frontline vehicles, crews were expected to connect shore power at the end of each shift. Sometimes that didn't happen, and if a battery was already weak or damaged, the ambulance could be dead by the next day. "If no other ambulance was available, the crew would wait for the maintenance team to jump start the ambulance," Schroeder says. Meanwhile, dispatch could be left scrambling for another active crew to take the call. The financial toll was just as real. Repeated deep discharges were destroying batteries. Schroeder says vehicles in the fleet averaged two to three battery changes a year, with two onboard batteries replaced each time. Across the fleet, the annual cost ran into the millions. The fleet incorporated solar into its production vehicles using ARMORCELL panels. Since then, Schroeder says not a single battery has been replaced on vehicles stored outside. By preventing deep discharges, solar helps keep those batteries conditioned and ready for service.
"If the ambulance is dead, that's a missed call for help."
"Bulky bolted frames, exposed wiring, and silicone caulk holding everything together on a $200,000 ambulance was not going to work," Schroeder says. Rigid crystalline panels could crack on impact, their frames added wind drag and leak points, and exposed wiring could snag on overhead obstacles. Flexible crystalline panels solved some of that but introduced another weakness: vibration, heat cycles and constant flexing could create microcracks in the cells, leading to failures that were hard to predict. "The failure rates across the board were unacceptable," Schroeder says. "And we saw an opportunity to do something about it."
"The ROI was a matter of a few months, and more importantly, vehicles are powered and ready for the next call," he says.
"If the ambulance is dead, that's a missed call for help."
Before ChargeSys launched ARMORCELL into the EMS market, most vehicle solar had been adapted from panels designed for buildings or stationary use. The compromises showed.
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2026 DISASTERS & RESILIENT CITY EXPO HOUSTON EDITION
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