King County Metro Transit Hybrid Articulated Buses: Interim DE-AC36-99-GO10337 Evaluation Results 5B
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A national laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy National Renewable Energy Laboratory Innovation for Our Energy Future King County Metro Transit Technical Report NREL/TP-540-39742 Hybrid Articulated Buses: April 2006 Interim Evaluation Results K. Chandler Battelle K. Walkowicz National Renewable Energy Laboratory NREL is operated by Midwest Research Institute ● Battelle Contract No. DE-AC36-99-GO10337 King County Metro Transit Technical Report NREL/TP-540-39742 Hybrid Articulated Buses: April 2006 Interim Evaluation Results K. Chandler Battelle K. Walkowicz National Renewable Energy Laboratory Prepared under Task No. FC06.3000 National Renewable Energy Laboratory 1617 Cole Boulevard, Golden, Colorado 80401-3393 303-275-3000 • www.nrel.gov Operated for the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy by Midwest Research Institute • Battelle Contract No. DE-AC36-99-GO10337 NOTICE This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States government. Neither the United States government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States government or any agency thereof. Available electronically at http://www.osti.gov/bridge Available for a processing fee to U.S. Department of Energy and its contractors, in paper, from: U.S. Department of Energy Office of Scientific and Technical Information P.O. Box 62 Oak Ridge, TN 37831-0062 phone: 865.576.8401 fax: 865.576.5728 email: mailto:[email protected] Available for sale to the public, in paper, from: U.S. Department of Commerce National Technical Information Service 5285 Port Royal Road Springfield, VA 22161 phone: 800.553.6847 fax: 703.605.6900 email: [email protected] online ordering: http://www.ntis.gov/ordering.htm Printed on paper containing at least 50% wastepaper, including 20% postconsumer waste Acknowledgements This evaluation is funded through the Advanced Vehicle Testing Activity, which is managed by Lee Slezak within the FreedomCAR & Vehicle Technologies Program in the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). All publications on the King County Metro Transit hybrid bus evaluation will be posted on the DOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Web site. Please see http://www1.eere.energy.gov/vehiclesandfuels/avta. This evaluation conducted at King County Metro Transit (KC Metro) would not have been possible without the support and cooperation of many people. Therefore, the authors wish to thank each of the following: U.S. Department of Energy Lee Slezak NREL Leslie Eudy KC Metro Jim Boon Colleen Duke Bernie Durant Todd Gibbs Ann Gonzales Wayne Hom Lynn Matteoni Jo Merrick George Stites GM Allison Peter Chiang New Flyer Industries Rick Brandenburg Paul Zanetel Caterpillar Dave Bradshaw NC Power Bill Hofer iii iv Table of Contents Executive Summary....................................................................................................................... vi Project Design and Data Collection........................................................................................... vi Hybrid and Diesel Buses........................................................................................................... vii Implementation Experience ...................................................................................................... vii Evaluation Results ...................................................................................................................viii Emissions Testing ....................................................................................................................... x Future Work................................................................................................................................x Overview......................................................................................................................................... 1 Advanced Vehicle Testing Activity............................................................................................ 1 Host Site Profile—KC Metro Transit ......................................................................................... 2 Description of the KC Metro Hybrid Transit Bus Project .......................................................... 2 Project Design and Data Collection............................................................................................ 8 Vehicle System Descriptions ...................................................................................................... 9 Facility Descriptions ..................................................................................................................... 14 Implementation Experience .......................................................................................................... 16 Evaluation Results (6 of 12 Months) ............................................................................................ 18 Route Descriptions.................................................................................................................... 18 Bus Usage ................................................................................................................................. 19 Fuel Economy and Cost............................................................................................................ 20 Maintenance Cost Analysis....................................................................................................... 23 Road Call Analysis ................................................................................................................... 32 Laboratory Emissions Testing .................................................................................................. 34 Future Work.................................................................................................................................. 36 Contacts......................................................................................................................................... 37 Acronyms and Abbreviations ....................................................................................................... 38 Bibliography ................................................................................................................................. 40 Appendix: Fleet Summary Statistics............................................................................................. 42 v Executive Summary This document is an interim technical report on a comparison and evaluation of new diesel and diesel hybrid-electric articulated buses operated as part of the King County Metro Transit (KC Metro) fleet in Seattle, Washington. This interim report covers the first six months of a planned 12-month evaluation at KC Metro. The evaluation is being completed through the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Advanced Vehicle Testing Activity (AVTA) by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Publication of the final report covering all 12 months of the evaluation is planned for fall 2006. KC Metro operates bus-only transit service in the 2,134-square-mile Seattle/King County, Washington, area. Its fleet consists of 1,400 standard and articulated buses, trolley buses, and streetcars. KC Metro recently began using 235 new hybrid-electric articulated buses that replace an older fleet of 236 dual-mode Breda articulated buses. The Breda buses were specially developed for use in the 1.3-mile Seattle downtown transit tunnel since its opening in 1990. This tunnel was built with light rail in mind but had been used only by the Breda dual-mode buses until the hybrid buses were introduced. The Breda dual-mode buses allowed zero-emission, fully electric propulsion operation inside the tunnel and diesel engine propulsion outside the tunnel or when the buses were not connected to the electric catenary system.1 Both the diesel and diesel hybrid-electric articulated buses at KC Metro were manufactured by New Flyer Industries. The hybrid buses include the General Motors (GM) Allison EP50 System parallel hybrid propulsion system. This fleet is the largest application of the GM Allison hybrid propulsion system to date. Project Design and Data Collection This evaluation focuses on diesel and hybrid diesel buses selected from three of KC Metro’s seven operating depots, or bases (see Table ES-1). All 30 of the new diesel articulated buses currently operate from the Ryerson Base depot; they are identical to the hybrid buses except for the hybrid-electric propulsion systems. Ten diesel buses were selected from Ryerson Base for detailed evaluation, and 10 hybrid buses were selected from Atlantic Base for comparison. The Ryerson diesel buses and the Atlantic hybrid buses have similar service and duty cycles— downtown service at an average speed of 13.3 mph for Ryerson and 11.2 mph for Atlantic.