Cost-Effective Planning Strategies for Battery Electric Bus Systems

In recent years, actions have been taken by countries around the world to create a more sustainable energy future. Electrifying transit buses is considered as a promising option to reduce emissions and increase sustainability of the transportation sector. However, there are still several barriers to the adoption of electric buses (e-buses). The barriers include, but are not limited to, the range limitations of e-buses, high up-front costs of e-buses, large capital expenses for charging infrastructure, and a lack of understanding regarding e-bus operation and management. This dissertation aims to overcome these barriers through the development of cost-effective planning strategies from the strategic and operational perspectives. Fist, this dissertation investigates the strategic planning problem of battery electric bus (BEB) fast charging stations in a multimodal transportation network with the objective of minimizing the total e-bus system cost. Second, assuming the layout of the transit system and the deployment of charging infrastructure as given, this dissertation presents an optimization model to enhance the charging schedule of a fast charging BEB system. To consider the interaction between the system infrastructure design and the charging schedule of a BEB system, this study further develops two comprehensive planning strategies. Numerical analyses demonstrate that the proposed planning strategies can effectively reduce the cost of BEB implementation