Technical Seminar : Practical Steps to Widescale e-Bus Adoption

Date, Time & Venue
11-April-2017 (Tue)
7:00 – 9:00pm
Room HJ304, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Programme Highlights
There are a number of real and perceived barriers which present potential operational and commercial risks to commercial transit operators when considering a move to zero-emissions solution. This presentation talks about some of these barriers to the market and how the latest technologies available today can be combined at a practical level to deliver a value e-bus proposition both to the operator and the travelling public with the ultimate aim of delivering a cost competitive and realistic choice of a zero-emissions public transport solution.

Speaker
Our guest speaker Mr. Paul Bromley has fulfilled a variety of senior roles and also as Head of Engineering at Alexander-Dennis Ltd. where he has overseen the successful launch of such groundbreaking products as the Dennis Dart, Trident and Enviro500 buses. Having worked on diesel emissions reduction and CNG projects previously and having more recently led the introduction of hybrid buses into Hong Kong, he is now working for China Green Dynamics leading the wider introduction of e-buses across the Asia-Pacific market.

Registration & Enquiries
This seminar is free and only on-line registration will be accepted via http://www.hkie-mmnc.org/. Registration is based on first-come-first-served and the participant number is limited to 120. Application deadline is 29-Mar-2017. For enquiries, please contact Ir Casey Lee of Automotive Engineering Specialist Group at aesg.mmnc@gmail.com (Tel: 9655-3709), or Ir Wing-Hay Tsang at whtsang@hkelectric.com (Tel: 3143-3813)

Report
Fossil-based automotive fuel solutions have dominated the commercial vehicle market for many years. However recent relative increases in oil prices has now prompted the market to reconsider alternative forms of power such as hybrid or electric as both clean and cost-effective means for road transport. Whilst China has taken 98% of the global total of electric bus (e-bus), outside China the perceived shortfalls of e-buses with respect to their diesel counterparts are still hindering any wide scale adoption where markets are forming judgements based on economic based judgements.

Addressing these market concerns where the concept of equipping a potential e-bus with ever more batteries that in turn increase vehicle weight, energy consumption and capital cost to address range anxiety issues involves taking an approach is to maximise e-bus range through using smart materials and structural analysis to aid weight reduction and optimising drive train efficiency to lower energy requirements in order to reduce the necessary on-board energy capacity. This can be achieved in a number of ways such as using the latest permanent magnet synchronous motor technologies, effective regenerative braking to recover energy loss, acceleration rate management (reflecting the driver's request for acceleration rather than a direct demand) and specification of the most energy efficient components in the areas of lighting, air conditioning and passenger information systems that will enable the e-buses to become a more practical proposition without compromising operational range, carrying capacity or overall cost.

Looking further forward there are now options to charge e-vehicles via 'opportunity' rapid charging at designated locations rather than a simple plug-in slow charge. This uses shared infrastructure at selected stopping points or within a depot, which can be shared by all vehicles. Given current available technologies, adoption of opportunity rapid charging tends towards using a lithium titanate type of battery which also allows the overall capacity carried on board a vehicle to be significantly reduced over the typical lithium ion battery type. The lighter weight of opportunity re-charging e-buses offers the potential for longer range and lower operating costs.

AESG thank the speaker, Mr. Paul Bromley, for his insightful sharing.