UPES Becomes First Private University to Win DRDO-Funded Project, Pioneering Extreme-Condition Battery Research
- UPES Editorial Team
- Published 03/09/2025
In a groundbreaking development, UPES has become the first private university in India to be awarded a DRDO-funded research project, marking a significant milestone for private participation in national defence innovation. Awarded by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the project will be carried out in collaboration with IIT Roorkee (Principal Investigator) and NIT Rourkela and focuses on developing next-generation Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) for microgrid applications in high-altitude, extreme-temperature environments.
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Know MoreThis historic opportunity comes after the successful technical defence by Dr. Devender Saini and the team from the Electrical Cluster at UPES, during the Governing Council (GC) meeting chaired by Dr. Sameer V. Kamat, Chairman, DRDO. The presentation sparked significant interest from Dr. Kamat, who recommended that the work’s scope be extended to include applications in combat vehicles.
The project is designed to tackle the critical challenge of maintaining battery functionality in extreme climates such as Siachen and Ladakh, where night-time temperatures often drop below –30°C. Conventional batteries tend to degrade or become inoperable under such conditions, which poses a serious risk to essential military systems such as communication, surveillance, medical support, and security infrastructure.
The team at UPES aims to make batteries operable at –40°C without altering their internal chemistry, ensuring that discharging remains reliable even during frigid nights and that charging can occur rapidly during brief solar exposure windows. To support this, UPES will design a dedicated battery controller for thermal management and develop a smart inverter system to optimise the use of all available energy sources — especially in remote off-grid locations where energy input can be inconsistent.
What elevates the project further is DRDO’s expressed interest in its extension to combat vehicles, where battery systems must endure extreme load variations, constant vibration, and severe weather. In such vehicles, battery failure and frozen fuel are known to limit mobility, and the solutions proposed by the UPES-led team could significantly enhance the resilience of defence mobility systems.
While initial concerns were raised by DRDO leadership over the organisation’s standing policy of not funding private universities, the merit and technical strength of the UPES-led proposal led to its approval — a monumental precedent in Indian defence R&D. Notably, although IIT Roorkee has been named the official PI, it was UPES that initiated the idea, built the collaboration, and drove the proposal through to its final defence. This showcases UPES’s leading role, even while holding the formal designation of Co-PI.
The project also signals a broader shift. For the first time, DRDO has demonstrated confidence in private academia’s ability to lead national defence projects, acknowledging the role of institutions like UPES in building indigenous, high-impact technologies that can shape the future of India’s strategic capabilities.
By combining forces with IIT Roorkee and NIT Rourkela, UPES is contributing to the creation of cutting-edge, indigenous energy storage solutions that can withstand India’s toughest geographies. These innovations hold promise not only for military use, but for a range of civilian energy systems where reliability in harsh conditions is essential.
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UPES Editorial Team
Written by the UPES Editorial Team
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