Technology Validation: Fuel Cell Bus Evaluations2010 DOE Vehicle Technologies and Hydrogen Programs Annual Merit Review and Peer Evaluation Meeting, June 7-11, 2010 -- Washington D.C

NREL is a national laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy operated by the Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC

Technology Validation: Fuel Cell Bus Evaluations

2010 DOE Annual Merit Review

Leslie Eudy, National Renewable Energy Laboratory

June 10, 2010

This presentation does not contain any proprietary, confidential, or otherwise restricted information

Project ID# TV008

Overview

Budget• FY 2010: $200K• FY 2009: $205K• FY 2008: $300K• Additional funding from

DOT/Federal Transit Admin.

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Timeline• Project started in FY03• First-generation FCB

completed in FY09• Second-generation FCBs

began 4th Qtr 2009

Tech. Val. BarriersA. Lack of fuel cell vehicle

performance and durability data

C. Lack of H2 fueling infrastructure performance and availability data

D. Need for maintenance and training facilities

Partners• Fleets: Operational data, fleet

experience• Manufacturers: Vehicle specs,

data and review• Fuel providers: Fueling data

and reviewNational Renewable Energy Laboratory Innovation for Our Energy Future

Objectives - Relevance• Overall: Validate fuel cell technologies in transit

applications– Analyze fuel cell bus (FCB) performance and cost compared

to conventional technologies to measure progress toward commercialization

– Provide “lessons learned” on implementing fuel cell systems in transit operations to address barriers to market acceptance

– Harmonize data collection efforts with other fuel cell bus demonstrations worldwide (in coordination with FTA and other U.S. and international partners)

• 2010– Complete analysis and report results on first generation FCBs– Begin data collection and analysis for next-generation fuel cell

buses at Burbank, SunLine, and AC Transit– Conduct crosscutting analysis of FCB status at all sites

3National Renewable Energy Laboratory Innovation for Our Energy Future

Evaluation Approach

• Data collection & analysis at transit sites– Follows existing, standard protocol– Uses cost-effective process utilizing data already collected

by agency– Includes data on baseline vehicles in same service– Builds database of evaluations/results

• Annual FCB Status report– Includes summary of data across all sites– Assesses progress and needs for continued success

• Expansion of data collected and analyzed as resources allow


Approach – Milestones

• Complete evaluations of 1st generation FCBs: – Santa Clara VTA: completed in FY07– AC Transit: completed in FY09– SunLine: completed in FY09– CTTRANSIT: completed in FY10– Overall assessment of 1st gen: Sep 10

• Begin evaluations of 2nd generation FCBs – SunLine: March 2010– City of Burbank: April 2010– AC Transit: May 2010


Comparison of Fuel Cell Buses to Conventional Technology Baseline

Metrics for assessing progress toward commercialization

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• Performance characteristics• Bus use • Fuel economy • Availability• Reliability – miles between road call (MBRC)• Cost – capital, fueling, and maintenance• Implementation experience

National Renewable Energy Laboratory Innovation for Our Energy Future

0

10,000

20,000

30,000

40,000

50,000

MBRC(Propulsion system)

0123456789

Fuel Economy(diesel equiv. gal)

0

1,000

2,000

3,000

4,000

5,000

6,000Average Monthly Miles

0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

100%Availability

Fleet Data Summary: SunLine

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Fuel Cell Bus (hybrid system)

CNG Bus

• 22 months operation of 1 FCB• Total miles: 39,236• Data with new version of fuel cell installed•Total FC system hours: 2,937

• 15 months operation of 5 CNG buses• Total miles: 362,259

65%94%

Fuel Cell Bus CNG Bus

1,783

4,830 8.0

3.6

2,750

45,282


FC System

Only 5,843

0

1

2

3

4

5

6


0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

3,000


0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

100%Availability

0

2,000

4,000

6,000

8,000

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12,000


Fleet Data Summary: CTTRANSIT

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Diesel Bus (baseline)

• 25 months operation of 1 FCB• Total miles: 35,690• Data with new version fuel cell installed• Total FC system hours: 5,424

1,428

3,204 5.4

3.7

68%

85%*

1,242

10,340

• 27 months operation of 3 diesel buses• Total miles: 259,547

* Goal for CTT buses



Fuel Cell Bus Diesel Bus

FC System

Only 6,005

0%10%20%30%40%50%60%70%80%90%

100%Availability

0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

3,000

3,500


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1

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Fleet Data Summary: AC Transit

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• ~26 months operation of 3 FCBs(Data with new version FC systems)

• Total miles: 151,950• Total FC system hours: 16,058• 2 FC systems over 5,000 hrs

• 12 months operation of 6 diesel buses• Total miles: 266,514

61%

85%*

2,082

3,699 6.8

4.2

1,520

10,661

* Goal for ACT buses



Diesel Bus (baseline)

Fuel Cell Bus Diesel Bus

FC System

Only 8,939

Data Summary: Costs

• Capital costs of buses dropping; larger quantity orders should help

• Fuel costs remain higher• Operational costs still higher

National Renewable Energy Laboratory Innovation for Our Energy Future10

Fuel Costs (per kg or gallon)ACT H2 $8.00 ACT Diesel $2.29 CTT H2 $5.29CTT Diesel $2.70SL H2 $8.00SL CNG $1.07

$0.00

$0.50

$1.00

$1.50

$2.00

$2.50

Total cost per mile Propulsion System Maintenance cost per

mile

Total Maintenance cost per mile

Fuel cost per mile

ACT FCB ACT Diesel SL FCB SL CNG CTT FCB CTT Diesel

H2 Infrastructure Data Summary

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VTA• Air Products• Liquid H2 storage• Dispenses compressed H2

SunLine• HyRadix• Natural gas reformer


Fleet Dates covered # Months

Total Fuel (kg)

Total Time (min)

Avg. Fill (kg)

Rate (kg/min)

Number Fills

VTA* Nov 2004 - Jun 2007 32 20,102 9,711 30.0 2.07 670

ACT Apr 2006 - Jan 2010 46 35,001 26,077 21.8 1.34 1,605

SunLine Jan 2006 - Jan 2010 49 17,060 16,281 20.1 1.05 847

CTT Apr 2007 - Jan 2010 34 7,767 11,693 22.5 NA 345

Totals 161 79,931 1.39 3,467

AC Transit• Chevron• Natural gas reformer

CTTRANSIT• UTC Power station • Praxair• Liquid H2 storage• Dispenses compressed H2

Hydrogen Station Descriptions

Hydrogen Fueling Data Summary

* VTA data reported previously – included to show total fuel dispensed

H2 Infrastructure Data Summary


Bus fueling requires

high fueling rates

Bus H2 fuel capacity ~50 kg,

require larger quantity fills

Transit agency targets for filling time:

under10 minutes

Collaborations

• Transit agencies provide data on buses, fleet experience & training, and review reports– California: AC Transit, Golden Gate Transit, Santa Clara VTA,

SamTrans, SunLine, San Francisco MTA– Connecticut: CTTRANSIT– South Carolina: Columbia Midlands RTA, USC

• Manufacturers provide some data on buses and review reports– Bus OEMs: Proterra, Van Hool– FC OEMs: Ballard, Hydrogenics, UTC Power– Hybrid system OEMs: BAE Systems, ISE

• Other organizations share information and data– National: CARB, NAVC, CTE, Calstart, EDTA– International: Various organizations from Germany, Iceland, Brazil,

Canada, China, Japan, England, AustraliaNational Renewable Energy Laboratory Innovation for Our Energy Future13

2009 2010 2011 2012NREL Hydrogen Bus Evaluations for DOE and FTA

Site/Location State Eval. Funding

DO

E T

echn

olog

y V

alid

atio

nFT

A N

atio

nal F

uel C

ell B

us

Pro

gram

AC Transit/ SF Bay Area

SunLine/ Thousand Palms


CTTRANSIT/ Hartford

City of Burbank/ Burbank

CTTRANSIT/ HartfordUSC, CMRTA/ ColumbiaUT/ Austin

AC Transit/ Oakland


Logan Airport / Boston

Albany / NY

TBD / NY

SFMTA / San Francisco

CA

CA

CA

CA

CT

CTSC, TXMA

NY

NY

CA

CA

CA

New York

SoutheastNew England

Southern California

Northern CaliforniaDemonstration sites color coded by geographic area:

1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4

CA ZEB Advanced Demo

FCB

FCB Demo

Accel.Test

Burbank FCB

Advanced FCB Project

American FCB Demo

Nutmeg Hybrid FCB Demo

MA H2 FCB Demo

Light-wt FCB

NYPA H2 Powered FCB

FC APU Hybrid

Hybrid FCB

South

Planned FCB Evaluations for DOE and FTA


June 2010

Future Work

• Remainder of FY 2010– Initiate data collection on next-generation fuel cell buses at

AC Transit, SunLine, and City of Burbank– Initiate detailed data collection on FCBs developed under

the FTA program– Complete final crosscutting analysis of 1st generation FCBs

at all sites• FY 2011

– Analyze data and report on new FCBs at Burbank, SunLine, and AC Transit

– Complete annual crosscutting analysis across sites– Continue coordinating data collection activities with FTA


SummaryProgress• Continued data collection & analysis of five FCBs in real-world service at three

transit agencies• Documented fuel economy improvement over conventional technology as high

as 2 times (depending on duty cycle)• Manufacturer has modified FC based on early results to increase durability and

reliability. New version installed in all 5 buses beginning in late 2007.


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Mile

s pe

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llon

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quiv

alen

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ACT FCB ACT Diesel

CTT FCB CTT Diesel

SunLine FCB SunLine CNG

Monthly Fuel Economy• Clean point with new

design FC System

• Two new FC systems have surpassed 5,000 hours without any repairs (routine maintenance only)

Summary (continued)Progress• Improvement seen in

availability with new fuel cell system

Unavailability by Category

• Results show increase in reliability

Monthly MBRC

• New generation designs expected to show marked improvement


0%

10%

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50%

60%

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80%

90%

100%

FC System Related Hybrid System Related Traction Battery Related

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2,000

4,000

6,000

8,000

10,000

12,000

14,000

16,000

Monthly Propulsion System MBRC Monthly FC System MBRC

New FC design

New FC design21% increase in MBRC

Avg MBRC: 6,102 Avg MBRC: 7,377

Documents

Technology Validation: Fuel Cell Bus Evaluations2010 DOE Vehicle Technologies and Hydrogen Programs Annual Merit Review and Peer Evaluation Meeting, June 7-11, 2010 -- Washington D.C