Solar-powered Stella Juva ambulance to undergo field tests in Kenya

A solar roof is about to face a harder test than a showroom floor. Stella Juva, a working ambulance prototype built by 23 student engineers at Eindhoven University of Technology, will be transported to Kenya for field testing after its presentation last month. It is designed as a mobile clinic for people living far from dependable roads, electricity and fuel, not as a high-speed ambulance racing toward a city hospital.

The vehicle carries a climate-controlled medical cabin with an X-ray machine for tuberculosis screening, ultrasound equipment for prenatal care, rapid malaria testing, automated external defibrillators and refrigeration for vaccines and medicines. A roof covered with All Back Contact photovoltaic cells feeds a 50-kWh lithium-based battery. The cells place their electrical contacts on the rear, helping the compact roof capture more daylight, including during partial cloud cover.

The engineering problem was not simply making a car move on sunlight. The team also had to protect sensitive medical equipment while the vehicle crossed rough terrain. Stella Juva uses separate power zones for the drivetrain and the medical cabin. If driving energy runs out, the system automatically prioritizes the remaining battery power for medical equipment, while pure sine wave inverters help prevent damaging voltage fluctuations.

Weight was another constraint. The carbon-fiber-composite chassis and body bring the vehicle to 1,350 kg, while a normal operational frontline ambulance typically weighs between 3,500 kg and 6,350 kg. The students say its teardrop-shaped body can deliver up to 715 km of driving range on a single sunny day, with a top speed of 120 km/h. Those figures come from the team’s own project and now face the more complicated conditions of real roads, weather and clinical work.

So what changes, concretely? If the field tests confirm the design, a medical team could carry diagnostic tools, emergency equipment and temperature-sensitive supplies into places where fuel deliveries and grid power are unreliable. Stella Juva is not yet a product: it is a university prototype, funded through sponsorships, academic support and nonprofit partnerships. But its open-source blueprints give manufacturers and health organizations a working platform to test, adapt and potentially build on.