The students are generally distinguished for the promotors of change. In this regard, a widely accepted thesis is attached to the six students and the occupation of the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at the "St. Cyril and Methodius" University in Skopje, which came up with the idea of creating an ETC bike - an electronic bike with installed filters which cleans the polluted air, making unique this kind of bike.
Filip Poposki and Marko Naseski are two of the six students who are part of the ETQ (eco transport citizen) project, which in the conversation with the Turkish news agency Anadolu Agency talked about this project, its importance for society, and for its future development.
As Poposki and Naseski explain, the main purpose of the project is to set up urban ecological transport systems with bicycles containing installed filters, which, according to their account, can be installed on almost any bike while clearing almost 9 meters cubic air with every one kilometer.
They confess that the idea for the ETC bicycle began about a year and a half ago when they started to examine the situation of the great air pollution in Macedonia, and they were motivated to do something to contribute to the solution of this important problem for the daily life.
In their intention to realize this idea they were instructed by the Professor of the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Ile Mirēeski, from whom they said have received great support. Additionally, they added that received support also by other professors of the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering.
"For this bike as the primary factor to be mentioned are the proactive filters installed on the wheels which purify the PM10 particles that are the biggest problem and the most harmful particles in air pollution. The electronic engine is important", emphasized Poposki. which adds that this bike is created for those who use it to get faster from one destination to another, but at the same time reduces the air pollution.
"The filters do not pose additional overload, the filters do not spend electricity and can be fitted on any bike," Poposki explains. He added that in order to increase the usability of the bicycles, is added a system of changing the speeds, similar to the classic one.
Student Naseski points out that this is the first bicycle prototype, which they still want to refine and offer in the market for the urban transport system. They point out that they have faced many difficulties and problems to come up to this stage of their project, namely to create a bicycle prototype, because a large number of spare parts should have been supplied from foreign countries.
The idea is for the ETC project to function in the way that public transport works now, to have a card that will allow the user to take the bicycle from a certain station. According to the project, the recharging of electronic bicycle batteries is carried out in stations, which also includes the bicycle lock.
"In the box at the wheel, there is an additional optimization from its current stage, has integrated card readers, similar to those used in public transport, and it is possible to be integrated with mobile phones. This turns on the mechanism which is installed on each bike and enables the use," Poposki explains.
Naseski adds that bicycles can be parked at a perimeter between 2 and 4 kilometers from the station. As he says, if such a system would be implemented in the city, the stations would be determined depending on the attendance of the people.
"If it is about an area that has the highest attendance rate of people, the likelihood is greater that immediately after parking, the bike will be taken by someone else. This increases the level of use, but we do not want to limit people of were to park the bike. You can park outside those stations," said Naseski and Poposki.
They say that in order for this system to operate, greater support will be needed from the municipalities.
They say similar successful projects of integrated systems already exist in Paris and Madrid, but in the case of the ETC project, this purifies tha air when using the bicycle.