Emission and life-cycle assessment of alternative-fuel buses: a case study of the Delaware Authority of Regional Transit |
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Authors: | Amir Shahpar Ardeshir Faghri |
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Institution: | 1. Transportation Consulting Manager, AECOM, Arlington, VA, USA;2. Department of Civil &3. Environmental Engineering, School of Public Policy &4. Administration, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, USA |
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Abstract: | The Energy Policy Act of 1992 motivated transit agencies to utilize alternative-fuel transit buses in addition to their popular diesel buses. Transit agencies have planned to add a significant number of alternative-fuel buses to their current transit fleets. This study is to inform policy makers who may allocate public funds for alternative-fuel bus projects to make a smarter decision in this regard. For each of the eight alternative-fuel buses, technologies introduced by the ACT, fuel efficiency, life-cycle cost (LCC) and emission are estimated and compared with the available information for the ultralow-sulfur diesel (ULSD) fuel buses. A case study in the State of Delaware is presented to demonstrate how the proposed approaches can be employed to evaluate the relative importance of the most viable alternative-fuel transit buses according to the predefined set of criteria. The results show that buses propelled by hybrid-diesel engine have the least LCC and emissions and are the most suitable alternative for the ULSD buses in the short- and midterm. |
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Keywords: | Public transportation alternative-fuel bus life-cycle cost emissions reductions transit environmental sustainability |
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