About a year ago, Maxwell Technologies told the world about the Chinese government using its ultracapacitors in various official vehicles. Another July brings another announcement, and so we learn that the city of Milan, Italy will soon be using Maxwell's ultracap modules in its hybrid and electric buses. The 125-volt BOOSTCAP ultracapacitor modules will store energy from the bus' brakes and then spit it back out for torque assist when the driver steps on the accelerator. Overhead electric lines or a diesel generator will supply the rest of the energy needed to move the public transit vehicles. Milan has ordered 70 buses from Vossloh Kiepe and Van Hool and will soon take deliver of the first 15. More details after the break.

[Source: Maxwell Technologies Inc.]

South Korean car manufacturer, Hyundai, has announced they are entering the hybrid bus business. We already knew they are going whole-hog into hybrid cars but buses are a beast of a different stripe. This is something they seem to have realized and so are approaching this market niche from a slightly different angle by beginning with a more affordable mild hybrid architecture.

Incorporating an 8Kw electric motor, this system is centered around stop-and-go. When the bus comes to a stop, so does the engine and when the foot comes off the brake the engine is spun back up to speed. Other hybrid tricks include regenerative braking and an electric fan for engine cooling. Because it is so simple the company hopes to offer both a diesel and CNG version and estimates the final cost to its customers to be about a fifth of a full hybrid design.

The first dozen should be delivered by the end of this month for real-world testing and the plan is to begin mass production by the end of 2009. It hasn't closed the door on a more efficient full hybrid either. Development work on that model should be completed by the middle of the summer with delivery to test fleets happening some time this Fall. Read the official press release after the jump.

There seems to be tons of innovative technologies being proposed, tried and tested these days. Some of the wilder ideas disappear quickly while others, which were thought to have gone extinct, make a dramatic comeback. One such cool tech is the automotive turbine.

Capstone Turbine Corporation has announced that they have received a nice juicy order for 150 of their C30 MicroTurbines(R) from the people who built the Tindo solar bus, Designline International. Though it is unknown at this time who the ultimate customer will be, the fact that they are being built at their North Carolina plant would seem to indicate that it is for somewhere in America.

The ECOSaver IV hybrid bus makes good use of the turbine, giving it "...up to 100% improvement in fuel economy over a traditional diesel...", according to Darren Jamison, President and Chief Executive Officer of Capstone Turbine Corporation. The turbines have only one moving part which rides on a "cushion of air" so no oil or maintenance is necessary. For more quotes and details, hit the jump.

I was reading the English version of the Asahi Shimbun the other morning when this article caught my attention. There's nothing really new about hybrid buses, even GMC makes them, but how about a plug-in hybrid bus you don't have to plug in. That's something you don't see everyday. At least not yet anyway. Such a bus just began a two-week testing period at Haneda airport in Tokyo's Ota Ward and will travel between terminals, morning and afternoon, covering a route of 4.2 kilometers (2.6 miles). According to the rather brief article the bus can charge "a large amount of electricity without using cords". I did some digging and with the help of the magic Google translator genie I found a few more details.

According to information gleaned from a "translated" web page from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, the bus is part of a core collaboration by government, industry and academia to implement next-generation low-pollution vehicles. Equipped with lithium-ion batteries and with a projected CO₂ savings of 60 percent over a traditional bus, this Hino beast of burden definitely falls into that category.

Now, about that cordless charging. Apparently it is using an electromagnetic inductive charging setup. There is a coil on the bottom of the bus and also one embedded in concrete. The efficiency and speed of the charging system is not stated and I couldn't tell whether or not it employs magnetically coupled resonance. Once I master Japanese I will make some calls and inquire further.

[Source : Asahi]

During his keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show, GM Chairman Rick Wagoner announced that the 1,000th transit bus equipped the the GM-Allison Two-Mode system would delivered this month and it was coming to Las Vegas. Las Vegas is doubling their hybrid fleet from thirty to sixty buses. The hybrid bus powertrain was introduced in 2003 and in 2007 over 400 of them were produced. So far the Seattle King County Metro Transit Authority has made the biggest commitment to the system, ordering 500 of the hybrid buses.

[Source: General Motors]

Interest in Daimler AG's diesel-electric hybrid buses is strong, the company announced this week. Over one thousand (1,052 to be exact) orders for the Orion VII hybrid buses have been placed, and Daimler says it will have these orders filled by 2010. Since the Orion hybrid bus was launched in 2003, Daimler says, over 2,600 orders have been placed.

We all know that city buses transport people through some of the most densely populated areas on the planet, so reducing some of the emissions that come from stop-and-go driving and idling is hugely important. Biodiesel does a good job of lowering emissions, but hybrid technology goes a long way as well. Daimler says that:

Compared to standard diesel propulsion, these hybrid buses deliver up to 30 percent better fuel economy while greatly reducing emissions: 90 percent less particulate matter, 40 percent less NOx and 30 percent fewer greenhouse gases. Drivers and riders enjoy a quieter, cleaner and smoother ride. (more after the jump)

Most of the Orion hybrids use lithium-ion batteries and capture some energy through regenerative breaking.

Just two municipalities are responsible for the big order:
MTA New York City Transit has ordered 850 and the City of Ottawa (OC Transpo) wants 202. Once Daimler delivers all these buses, MTA will have almost 1,700 diesel-electric hybrid buses, which Daimler says will be the largest diesel-electric hybrid fleet in the world.

Related:

• From Lead Acid to Lithium Ion on the Orion Hybrid Bus Battery Pack
• Daimler shows 16 eco-friendly trucks and buses

[Source: Daimler AG]

Transit buses, school buses and local delivery trucks and vans would seem to be a natural application for hybrid drive-train technology, and they are. The short-range, start and stop duty cycle is able to take maximum advantage of the regenerative braking to boost fuel efficiency and reduce emissions. So why is it that the number of hybrid school buses or parcel delivery trucks in the US remains mired in the dozens or low hundreds? Even hybrid transit buses only number in the low thousands.

It all comes down to cost. Aside from the transit buses, most of the other hybrids have been essentially hand built so far, a process that costs a fortune. Even the buses have much lower production volumes than hybrid passenger vehicles. That means little or no economies of scale. Since fleet operators have tight budgets, until the up-front costs come closer to the price of conventional models, the savings in operating costs won't be enough to justify the purchase. Meanwhile manufacturers are reluctant to tool up for mass production unless there is a known market. So we have the chicken and egg conundrum. Without some kind of tax incentives for fleet operators to make the switch, we are unlikely to see a big increase in the numbers of heavy-duty hybrids anytime soon.

[Source: Drive.com.au]