Examining the effect of infrastructure features on the energy consumption of diesel and electric buses: A microsimulation-based analysis

Abstract

The transition from fossil fuel-powered buses to battery-powered buses has been a long process. How to deploy such a mixed bus fleet composed of diesel and electric buses to minimize the energy consumption of transit systems is one of the biggest challenges faced by transit agencies. This study takes an important step in addressing this challenge by investigating the impact of different infrastructure features on the energy consumption of diesel buses and electric buses under a variety of traffic conditions. We leverage a simulated-based approach to generate various transit operating scenarios, and adopt two vehicle activity-based energy consumption models for diesel and electric buses. Preliminary results show that bus stop density has a positive linear effect on the energy consumption of both types of buses. Under congested traffic, diesel buses consume less fuel on dedicated bus lanes, while electric buses achieve energy conservation on regular lanes.