100% electric coach

[windtrader]

Naturally, there are many aspects of running electric buses in commercial operation. Nowadays, the USA continues to loose ground as the technology leader.

As of 2017, 99% of electric buses have been deployed in China, with more than 385,000 buses on the road, which is 17% of China's total bus fleet.

Wikipedia statement is a bit eyeopening about the vast commercial deployment of ebuses.

[HB of CJ]

!00% Internal Battery Electric Bus ...

Anybody here old enough to remember way way back over 50 years ago when Honda Presented the first for USA domestic use the Honda Automobile?   I do.  Worked at a very large Honda motorcycle dealership assembling motorcycles from big cardboard boxes on wood pallets.  A fun easy job.

Then the first Honda Car arrived on the showroom floor.  We employees all laughed.  What a piece of junk.  Horrible fit.  Horrible finish.  Nothing worked.  Horrible driver.  But ... that was then.  Now Honda builds one of the best cars in the world.  Yep.  Give the electric bus some time.  Bound to get better.

Just me.

[Jeremy]

I'm really glad to read these last two posts 'cos I've been rolling my eyes and biting my tongue at this thread for days, and it's nice to be able to give my facial muscles a rest.

The problem with the constant repetition of all these sage and wise back-to-first-principles arguments against the practicalities of electric vehicles (and renewable-power generation and all the rest) is that it ignores the fact that - like it or not - the rest of the world is zooming ahead with this stuff and those sage and wise people are getting left further and further behind.

Jeremy

[chessie4905]

That's fine for a change. When it is successful, we can copy them for a change. Save all that research money. Chinese have done it for years.

[CrabbyMilton]

Bottom line here is that these things will improve but as these electric vehicles are now, they are not to the point of being as reliable, practical and cost effective yet.
Change just for the sake of it is stupid most especially if you just want to impress the rest of the world even though the rest of the world doesn't like us anyway.
The BOEING 787 is known to be a lemon because for whatever reason, they couldn't just use existing engines and electrical systems. No they just had use untested components just to say it was all new.
How did that work out?

[Jim Blackwood]

The ground is littered with the sad remains of well over 98% of all things excitedly proclaimed to be NEW! and mostly taken up by the under 30 crowd, much to their later dismay. And that's fine, that's progress. It's the way things get better because that remaining less than 2% often is really quite good.

Where does any specific item fall? Usually you can't tell, and the only real way to find out is to either climb aboard or wait and see. After a few years of climbing aboard most people stop doing that, and this is the reason why the older folks are mostly in the "wait and see" crowd. Simple human nature at work. So there's no reason to decry the reluctance of the old timers because they aren't eager to jump in, after all, they've done their time. They can all give examples of when they excitedly adopted the certain new thing that then proceeded to flop, and even tell you about the ones that got away. The odds just don't favor making any more investment in it when it's much more important to secure your last years when there is going to be nobody around to look after you.

Jim

[chessie4905]

The things we've seen...45 rpm records>audio tapes>cassette tapes>CD's>mp3's>Ipods> the cloud...
VHS tapes>dvd's>streaming video....
That's why we don't get real exicited about all electric vehicles or buses. Eventually, it may happen but after I'm pushing up daisys or dandelions.

[CrabbyMilton]

It's not like electric buses are new and...oh wait. Those are the ones that completely depend on overhead wires and won't work anywhere else.

[richard5933]

It's not like electric buses are new and...oh wait. Those are the ones that completely depend on overhead wires and won't work anywhere else.

I don't think that's true anymore. Nashville is one place that I've seen electric buses operating without overhead lines. They have quick charge stations where they can top off in 10 minutes, which can easily be built into the route. I'm sure these are in use elsewhere.

Like it or not, electric buses are going to become more and more common.

I think it's important to remember that some of the most successful early automobiles were fully electric. The only thing that kept them from continuing was the limitation in battery technology. Had better batteries existed, it's anyone's guess which direction the auto industry would have taken back then.

[windtrader]

One last reference  - electric is not only here but totally pervasive in some areas of the world, not the USA of course. From the Wall Street Journal. If you doubt the validity of the source or don't read the article, there is no hope.

A national project to replace millions of gasoline-fueled taxis, buses and trucks with new electric models is boosting China's ambitions to lead the global shift to battery-powered transportation.

In China's southern tech hub of Shenzhen, for example, all buses and taxis will be electric by the end of this year, with generous subsidies helping drive the switch.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-has-early-lead-on-electric-commercial-vehicles-1543755601

[CrabbyMilton]

As I've said, this technology with improve.
However, I don't want pattern anything after China.
We can do it better they just copy us.

[windtrader]

This topic is really a tentacle of the massive octopus China has become in dominating technology development and deployment. This article alone demonstrates the massive investment the government is committing to converting to electric transportation. At least there was support for the govt credit for purchase of electric vehicles here but that seems to be loosing support, so sad.


Look at the deployment of high speed rails in China, another tentacle of the beast. It makes look Japan look antiquated much less the totally stupid bullet train to nowhere in the California desert.


Look at the massive battle taking place in 5G dominance. Huawei is yet another tentacle for pushing the leading edge of the next generation of wireless communication.


The USA hasn't lost the war yet but plenty bruised up in many battles. We had all better wake up soon or we're toast.

[CrabbyMilton]

The fact that the govt. has to pay people to want to buy them sort of shows that few want them.
Let the market decide such things.
I still wonder how the J4500e will sell. If it goes well, it's just matter of time before I'll get to ride on one on a charter trip. If not so be it.

[kyle4501]

Govt subsidies are actually paid for with tax payer money.

The free market isn't perfect, but history shows it is way more efficient than anything controlled by the govt.

If most vehicles go electric, where is the electricity going to come from?
Coal & fossil fuel? too dirty.
Nuclear? the power is temporary, but the waste is forever.
Hydroelectric? may kill something that we haven't even discovered yet.
Solar? not much good at night or cloudy/ rainy days.
Wind? Noise & detrimental to birds.
Geothermal? Requires so much water & possible release of greenhouse gases.

Still no free lunch!

[richard5933]

Regardless of where or what fuel they get the electric from, it seems to me that having a centralized plant making the electric is more a more efficient use of the fuel than having millions of individual power plants running down the road. There are lots of new technologies coming online and I'm looking forward to seeing what comes on line in the coming years.