Bus operators in urban environments throughout Europe face a dilemma with each bus after around 5 to 7 years of service. Typically, 90% of their fleet is diesel ICs that are highly polluting but relatively low cost to purchase. After 5 years’ service, manufacturer’s warranties end, making cost to operate and maintain the buses high, as a result, bus operators commonly overhaul the buses which includes repowering the bus. Bus Operators also face increasing pressure from governments in Europe to provide cleaner buses, several large cities have full diesel bans coming into force in 2025.
Societal Need: During 2010, Europe had 600,000 early deaths attributed to air pollution , with diesel fumes being a significant contributor to this, see figure 4; as a result, LEZs and ZEZs are becoming more popular throughout Europe to reduce levels of air pollution. During April 2015, the Supreme Court ordered the UK government to meet EU standards on Nitrogen Dioxide levels after missing targets since 2010. The court case brought by Client Earth will ensure the UK Government will take action by the end of 2015 ahead of the previous targeted of 2030.
Announced in March 2015 ahead of this ruling, the world’s first Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) was announced by the Mayor of London to more than half vehicle exhaust pollutants by 2020 . This will require bus operators to replace their operating fleet with new compliant buses and relocate existing vehicles to other towns and cities that do not have emission restrictions. With tighter restriction happening across Europe, LEZ, ZEZ and ULEZ solutions do not solve the wider problem, instead aging high emission bus fleets are often deployed at other location with no nett emission benefit. Most large cities already have legislation in place to ban vehicles entering the city, as enacted earlier this year by the French government banning half the private cars from entering Paris due to pollution levels.
The aim of this project is to develop a reliable, easy to install retrofit all-electric drive and recharge system that will replace diesel drives and provide a payback to bus operators within 3 years (as identified during Phase 1) based on reduced capital and operating costs. The solution will consist of an electric drive system (motor, gearbox and controller), battery and recharger pack. There is currently no commercially available retrofit package for buses. Hence, the project will enable us to enhance the design, identify strategic partners and test the market for our proposed system.
