Proterra electric buses pass 2M revenue-miles mark
01 March 2016
Proterra Inc. announced that its US fleet has surpassed two million miles of revenue service. Proterra has 63 buses on the road today in Texas, California, Massachusetts, Nevada, Kentucky, Tennessee, Florida, South Carolina and Washington.
In aggregate, Proterra has saved transit agencies across North America more than 420,000 gallons in fuel and prevented more than 7.6 million pounds of CO2 emissions.
In 2014, Clemson Area Transit (CATBUS) in Seneca, South Carolina became the first transit system in North America to completely electrify its entire fleet, following the deployment of Proterra battery-electric buses.
This year, Proterra will nearly double its production capacity as an increasing number of transit agencies see zero-emission buses as a credible and proven alternative to diesel, CNG and hybrid buses.
With 30% fewer parts than alternative technologies, the Proterra Catalyst dramatically reduces maintenance and operating costs and is more cost-effective over the 12-year life of each bus, saving customers around $450,000 over the vehicle’s lifetime, Proterra said.
The Proterra Catalyst features the longest range per kWh of energy storage and the lowest fuel cost per mile, at 22 MPGe and 1.7 kWh/mile.
Good going Proterra.
At 1.7 kWh/mile or 22 MPGe these buses are at least 3X as efficient as equivalent diesel units?
However, the claimed 12 year life is too short for an electric vehicle?
Posted by: HarveyD | 01 March 2016 at 09:52 AM
Harvey said:
'However, the claimed 12 year life is too short for an electric vehicle?'
Nope.
Just fine for a bus, which do one heck of a mileage in that time.
Posted by: Davemart | 01 March 2016 at 12:17 PM
This will be my standard comment regarding buses for a while. Cities who have buses for public transportation should form a national purchasing consortium. This would allow them to collectively commit to relatively large purchases of buses (large for the bus manufacturers) while the individual cities would only commit to a small portion of the purchase. This would give the manufactures the large stable orders they need to assure financial success and to reduce costs through efficiencies of scale. Yet, the individual cities would only need to a small portion of the overall order. This would drive down the price of electric buses and reduce risk for manufacturers. Perhaps the cities could commit to replacing all of their buses with electric drive over a ten year period. A single large purchase of enough buses to replace all buses over ten years for some 10-20 cities should be a large enough order and commitment to significantly lower bus costs and provide a secure financial future for the bus companies.
Yes, too idealistic and our politicians are not smart nor care for the people. However, it would work. I know the cities won't do it but it is what they should do. We watch our leaders fail constantly because they are primarily concerned with power and greed.
Posted by: Brotherkenny4 | 02 March 2016 at 07:08 AM
That would connect production and consumption in a very big way. Business would be more efficient, spending more on design and manufacturing than marketing and sales. Republicans would call it "socialism".
Posted by: SJC | 04 March 2016 at 03:14 PM
B4. That is already done for 15 cities in our Province with the Provincial Treasury picking up 70% to 90% of the bill. The advantage has been locally built 40-ft units (from Volvo Canada) and imported articulated 66+ ft units.
Centralized purchasing has missed many good e-units from BYD, Proterra, Flyers, Man, Mercedes in favor of local Volvo e-units.
The one of a kind locally built buses cost more than the mass produced normalized imported units.
Posted by: HarveyD | 06 March 2016 at 10:17 AM