USU technology to power new bus route in Salt Lake
The future of bus transportation may ride on WAVE, a company founded to commercialize a technology developed at USU. The company will install a first-of-its-kind, electrically based bus system in Salt Lake City.
The Federal Transit Administration awarded the Utah Transit Authority a $2.7 million grant for WAVE, which stands for wireless advanced vehicle electrification, to install the new bus route on the University of Utah campus.
WAVE will install power stations beneath the pavement on the route. When a bus stops over the station for a few minutes, it will recharge the battery using a magnetic field, which eliminates the need to plug in.
James May, vice president of business development for WAVE, said the system also reduces the size and weight of the battery needed to run the engine.
May said most electric vehicles need a battery large enough to get them through an entire day’s use and then come back and recharge overnight, but the new bus has different needs.
“You can have a battery that is considerably smaller because all the battery really needs to do is run the bus for its lap before it comes back and charges it again,” May said.
The size and cost of the batteries needed to run electric vehicles is one of the biggest roadblocks keeping people from adopting them, he said.
“(People) would like to use electric vehicles,” May said. “They’re cleaner, they perform better and they don’t rely on hydrocarbon fuel. The problem is just that the battery issue is just getting in the way. There’s such a cost penalty with the battery. But if we can greatly shrink the battery and spend a little bit of money on infrastructure, that’s the ultimate goal.”
Eventually, he said, power stations might be installed across more roadways to power electric cars, but that scenario is still down the road.
“Getting to a point where our electric vehicles charge on public roads while they’re in motion and while they’re en route is quite a step away, and will likely be 5 to 10 years away,” he said.
Electric vehicles are seen by many as a good way to lessen the impact of transportation on environment, to the Alternative Fuels and Advanced Vehicles Data Center.
“Vehicles that run on electricity produce no tailpipe emissions,” its website states. Although, that’s not to say electric vehicles have no impact at all.
“The only emissions that can be attributed to electricity are those generated in the production process at the power plant,” the site states.
While the car itself produces no emissions, the coal plant or hydroelectric plant that generated the electricity impacted the environment in some way. However, electric plants produce less of most types of pollutants than gas-burning cars do, the site states.
USU currently uses compressed natural gas as fuel for its shuttle buses. Recently, the university was recognized for its efforts to promote alternative fuels when Gov. Gary Herbert visited campus and declared November awareness month for alternative fuel vehicles.
Alden Erickson, shuttle supervisor for USU Parking and Transportation Services, said he’s not aware of any future plans to convert to electricity. While compressed natural gas buses do produce emissions, they are cleaner than alternatives like diesel buses, Erickson said.
“Diesels put out (carbon monoxide) as their main component. Natural gas puts out nitrous. Nitrous is a little easier on the environment than carbon monoxide,” he said. “Therefore, it’s cleaner because it’s a cleaner fuel.”
Installing a wireless power transfer bus system would require some extra money, as well. The $2.7 million grant will cover the cost of one bus to service a single route, May said. Additional buses would be cheaper to add than the first, he said.
“It would be roughly half a million dollars extra per bus, probably. Which is
roughly equivalent to a low-sulphur diesel bus, and quite a bit cheaper than a diesel-electric hybrid bus,” May said.
While it may take several years for wireless power transfer highways to become a reality, May said the technology fits the needs of public transit well.
“For public transit vehicles,” May said, “the technology is ready now.”
– steve.kent@aggiemail.usu.edu