Adding electric coaches to a passenger transport fleet is problematic for many operators. While those vehicles may be suitable for transporting commuters from the towns surrounding London to the centre of the capital, range constraints pose difficulties when it comes to deploying them on longer distance work.
They are difficulties that Yutong importer Pelican Bus & Coach is determined to surmount with the roll-out of tri-axle 14m GTe14, which can house up to 57 seats. Recently on trial with National Express on its route between Stansted Airport and London, that model has a range of up to 300 miles. Its stablemate, the up-to-51-seat two-axle 12.2m TCe12, manages 200 miles. “TCe12 is used a lot on commuter runs and on day trips,” confirms Pelican’s head of Yutong sales, Ian Downie.
The additional range offered by the GTe14 makes tour work more feasible, assuming charging points can be found. In addition, because it is longer, the GTe14 offers more underfloor luggage locker space than the TCe12 – an advantage on tours and airport runs.
Much of the space available in the TCe12 is taken up by the battery pack. When you are servicing commuters, this use of the space is not an issue given that they‘re more likely to be carrying briefcases and tablets than bulky suitcases. “Remember that rollover protection considerations mean we cannot put batteries on a coach’s roof,” says Downie. “We have to put them in the chassis area to ensure a low centre of gravity.”
Capacity calculations
TCe12 offers up to 350kWh of battery capacity, compared with up to 600kWh for the GTe14, says Downie. Supplied with an eight-year warranty, the batteries are lithium iron phosphate (LFP) and Yutong favours 150kW DC fast-charging and CCS2 connectors to the exclusion of AC. “Using this approach you can recharge a TCe12 in two hours and a GTe14 in four hours,” he contends. “We could potentially get more batteries onto the TCe12 – and more passengers, too – but we’re restricted by an 11.5-tonne drive axle weight limit. In some markets the weight limit is 13 tonnes.”
At the time of writing, over 50 electric Yutong coaches had been delivered to British customers, alongside well over 400 electric buses from the same stable. “Yutong electric buses and coaches require from 30% to 40% less maintenance than diesel models, they’re easier to work on, and noise and vibration levels are far lower than they are with diesels,” Downie observes. Good news from the viewpoint of passenger comfort.
“Furthermore, while a diesel coach might average 10mpg to 12mpg, the equivalent energy figure for an electric coach expressed in mpg terms is more like 30mpg,” he states.
On the other hand, the front-end price of an electric coach is some 50% higher than that of a diesel model – although government funding may be available to help mitigate the pain. Low running costs, however, mean that the operator should be in profit after six or seven years, Downie asserts.
While Volvo’s BZR Electric chassis would be suitable for coach applications, at present only Yutong is supplying new electric coaches to British customers. Admittedly demand is small currently, but the way in which Yutong is able to leverage its enormous global output means that any effort it may have to make to achieve a comparatively modest number of registrations is not an issue, says Downie. “The company has produced around 575,000 buses and coaches over the past ten years and is active in over 100 countries,” he points out.
Alternative alternatives
Daimler Buses is promising to introduce electric coaches, but not until 2030. Battery-electric technology is, of course, not the only route to achieving zero-emission status and, in 2023, Wrightbus was awarded government funding under the Advanced Propulsion Centre’s Advanced Route to Market Demonstrator (ARMD2) scheme to develop a hydrogen fuel cell powertrain for coaches.
An alternative to acquiring a new electric coach is to re-power a diesel model you already own. It is a service offered by Equipmake, which among other projects has replaced the diesel engine in a Van Hool T917 in service with Westway Coaches with a 545kWh battery pack and an electric motor. It has given it a range of up to 220 miles, says the converter.
Equipmake argues that the vast majority of coaches remain in service for 25 years or more, which means that operators can make savings by repowering a vehicle halfway through its usable life. Repowering a luxury coach, such as a T917, costs roughly £250,000, says Equipmake CEO, Ian Foley. That equates to roughly half the price of an equivalent new model.
“The work takes around four weeks,” he confirms. Batteries and luggage can jockey for locker space with a wheelchair lift, which may have to be fitted depending on the type of work the coach is on.
Mandating ease of access for people in wheelchairs, the Public Service Vehicles Accessibility Regulations (PSVAR) 2000 apply to all new buses and coaches with a capacity exceeding 22 passengers used to provide a local or scheduled service. They do not affect coaches used for tours or day-long excursions. They do, however, apply to coaches used on rail replacement work and on home-to-school runs if any fares are paid – but a temporary exemption has been granted in both cases until 31 July 2026. The exemptions may be extended, but there are no guarantees. Some operators could face major challenges if they are not renewed, and they are obliged to comply.
Accessibility
Retrofit a wheelchair lift to a coach and you could be adding a tonne or more to its unladen weight, says Road Haulage Association operations manager, coach sector, Andy Warrender. That is likely to spell bad news for the vehicle’s fuel consumption, and result in a potential reduction in its range if it happens to be electric. “Furthermore, the lift will probably cost you around £30,000 or more,” he observes.
If operators opt to order a new coach that is PSVAR compliant rather than retrofit, they could be waiting two years before it is delivered, he adds. That means it will probably arrive after the exemption deadline expires. “A review of PSVAR was promised under the last government’s Bus Back Better manifesto. There was a call for evidence last year and we expected a report to be produced before the end of 2023. We were then told that we would have to wait until the end of 2024.
“Since we were told that, a new government has been elected, so the industry is having to start all over again,” admits Warrender.
Safe seats
No matter whether they are travelling sitting in a wheelchair or on a conventional seat, coach passengers want to arrive at their destination safely. That won’t happen if the driver is suddenly taken ill or passes out at the wheel – and the vehicle goes out of control and crashes. That is why MAN has introduced SafeStop Assist. It monitors lane keeping as well as the distance, position and relative speed of objects ahead, among other factors, alerts the driver if things seem to be going awry, then brings the coach to a halt safely if there is no response.
Says Heinz Kiess, head of product marketing, bus, at MAN Truck & Bus: “No other manufacturer offers such a system for all current coach models – and it can prevent serious accidents.”
