The 19C-1E electric digger has won the 2020 MacRobert Award, a prize for innovation that has been presented since 1969 to honour a wide variety of engineering feats, including the CT scanner and the Rolls-Royce Pegasus engine used in the Harrier jump jet.
JCB faced strong competition for this year’s award from two other shortlisted finalists: the all-electric I-PACE sports utility vehicle from Jaguar Land Rover and ecoSMRT® liquid natural gas reliquification technology from Babcock’s LGE business.
Professor Sir Richard Friend FREng FRS, Chair of the Royal Academy of Engineering MacRobert Award judging panel, said: “JCB’s electric digger is a huge engineering achievement. The team has developed all parts of the electric propulsion system to deliver system performance that matches real customer requirements. This is a huge achievement in itself, but the additional benefits of zero exhaust emissions and much lower noise has lifted the 19C-1E excavator to a new level.”
As well as significantly reducing carbon emissions, the electric digger has zero exhaust emissions and very low noise levels. This combination makes it much better suited than traditional construction vehicles to operating inside buildings or in areas where noise must be kept to a minimum. With zero emissions, it is also suited to use in tunnelling work or underground quarrying applications or multi storey car parks.
