A novel on the retrofit from CNG buses to electric buses for rubber-tyred wheeled public transportation systems

Abstract

The trend toward electric buses worldwide is increasing day by day. Along with it, sectoral infrastructure elements are developing rapidly. Electric buses offer advantages in terms of operating costs and environmental emission values. Despite this, the most important disadvantage is that the purchasing costs have not yet reached the expected level compared to other internal combustion engine buses. Many country and especially city-based targets have been determined for electric solutions in rubber-tyred public transportation systems in the world. Only in Shenzhen city of China, 100% transition to electric bus solution has been achieved in public transportation. In this study, a different perspective has been put forward for the acceleration of the transition to the use of electric buses and the increase in the prevalence of public transportation enterprises. The concept of retrofit. This is conversions of the conventional powered (diesel and CNG) buses into electric buses, which are currently used. For the concept in paper, the actual project costs for one of the world’s most important public transportation companies have been revealed. According to the analysis results obtained, for Payback Period (PB) method are based on a fleet of 100 vehicles in total, the return time of the investment required for the results based on this approach which retrofit from CNG to Electric, is calculated as 8.74 years. For the Payback Period (PB) approach, it has been concluded that for the 5 years, which is envisaged to be taken as a reference, retrofit concept (from CNG to Electric) should be based on 100000 € per vehicle based on the current operating conditions. This retrofit approach based on the concept of sustainable public transportation is expected to become widespread with the results obtained.