UK Bus Operator: Manufacturers Are Not Doing Enough
by Sami Grover, Carrboro, NC, USA on 12.11.07
We’ve already seen attempts to make bus travel more sustainable in cities around the world, from Delhi to Berlin to Jerusalem to London. While such moves may be encouraging experiments, it seems that the major vehicle manufacturers are not pulling their weight when it comes to greening their stock, at least if Brian Souter, CEO of UK bus and rail operator Stagecoach, is to be believed. The company has recently started its own biofuels trial in Scotland, using fuel made from waste feedstocks:
"The bus operators and transport groups can lean more heavily on manufacturers to be more imaginative and effective. We think that manufacturers should be spending more on research and development. Our indigenous manufacturers are doing more. We want to see some of the big boys, making some of the components, trying a bit here."
We welcome this kind of focus from a major operator like Stagecoach, but it does sound a little like Mr Souter is putting all his eggs in one basket. He roundly rejected hybrid buses, saying that the fuel savings do not justify the extra costs, and played down fears over biofuels threatening food supplies after rival operator National Express cancelled a biofuels trial due to environmental concerns:
"We don't agree with that. We were disappointed [with National Express]. There need to be clear parameters in developing countries where biofuels come from. And there needs to be an embargo on biofuel coming from rain forests."
It is great to see that Mr Souter is at least concerned about the manufacturing process of biofuels, but we would argue that any credible strategy for greening our transport must pay at least as much attention to efficiency and conservation as it does to alternative fuels. Hopefully Stagecoach is planning to lead the way on this front too. ::The Guardian::via site visit::
You pull weight, not "pull wait".
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Author's comment:
Ooops - apologies for that. I will fix immediately.
Where did you get the image from? It looks very much a Stagecoach electric trolley bus from Wellington NZ, not Stagecoach UK. The design and number (not that I'm a bus-spotter!) indicate that it's one of the newly-refurbished units that are starting to roll out and replace our ageing fleet.
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Author's comment:
Ooops - you are totally correct Tom - that is an NZ Stagecoach. My apologies for any misrepresentation.
They've had hybrid and biodiesel buses in service in Vegas for years.
He's exactly wrong about hybrid buses. Where hybrid helps the most is when you have to start and stop alot which exactly what buses do. There's a reason UPS and FedEx are buying dybrid delivery trucks. Where hybrid doesn't help is long distance hiway cruising but that's where biodiesel really shines.
There's been some hybrid buses in London for years, last year they introduced the first double-deck hybrid, but they don't seem to be spreading -- all the hybrid ones have green leaf designs on them, but there still aren't many.
Even if GM doesn't currently make any hybrid cars, besides suv's, they at least make good hybrid buses.
This is from GM's site:
The System improves fuel economy and provides up to a 90 percent reduction in certain emissions over a conventional diesel system in a transit bus application. These results are based on the Central Business District-14 (CBD-14) operating cycle.
We already have hybrid technology in production. We started with hybrid systems for transit buses where the fuel savings impact is the highest. Today, we have 364 transit buses operating in 25 cities in the US and Canada, including Seattle; Stockton and Orange County, California; Philadelphia, Houston, Tampa, and Albuquerque . In addition, a fleet of GM hybrid-powered buses is operating in Yosemite National Park.