http://www.pe.com/articles/bus-755333-buses-electric.html RIVERSIDE: Old buses turned into green machines BY DAVID DANELSKI / Nov. 30, 2014
[images http://images.onset.freedom.com/pressenterprise/gallery/nfvl17-b88225860z.120141130152215000gjo5vgau.10.jpg http://images.onset.freedom.com/pressenterprise/gallery/nfvl18-b88225860z.120141130152215000gjo5vgag.10.jpg http://images.onset.freedom.com/pressenterprise/gallery/nfvl18-b88225860z.120141130152215000gjo5vgai.10.jpg http://images.onset.freedom.com/pressenterprise/gallery/nfvl18-b88225860z.120141130152215000gjo5vgak.10.jpg http://images.onset.freedom.com/pressenterprise/gallery/nfvl18-b88225860z.120141130152215000gjo5vgam.10.jpg http://images.onset.freedom.com/pressenterprise/gallery/nfvl18-b88225860z.120141130152215000gjo5vgao.10.jpg http://images.onset.freedom.com/pressenterprise/gallery/nfvl19-b88225860z.120141130152215000gjo5vgaq.10.jpg ] Manufacturer winning recognition for transforming diesel buses into non-polluting electric models. COMPLETE COACH WORKS WHAT: A Riverside company that rebuilds and customizes used buses and larger recreational vehicles EMPLOYEES: 300 WHERE: Off Spruce Street at the end of Service Court in Riverside INFORMATION: completecoach.com An old Indianapolis bus looked more like a skeleton than a mass-transit workhorse as it sat in the workshop of a Riverside bus re-manufacturing company. Gone were the seats, windows, floorboards as well as the diesel engine. In a few weeks, the transformation was complete. What had been a soot-emitting behemoth became a nonpolluting, all-electric, green machine capable of traveling more an 130 miles before needing to be recharged. Complete Coach Works has been rebuilding used buses at its plant off Spruce Street for more than 29 years. But it is now winning recognition for turning old polluters into zero-emission models. The company got a big boost this spring when it won a $12.2 million contract from the Indianapolis transit agency to turn 22 worn-out diesel buses into clean electric vehicles. “We are really excited,” said Justin Scalzi, an account manager for the company during a tour of company’s facilities in October. “Once we have these buses out on the road in Indiana, the other transit agencies will realize that we are the real thing.” The company’s non-polluting bus propulsion system was recently recognized by the South Coast Air Quality Management District for advancing air pollution control technology, and the air district provided the firm $395,000 toward its research and development efforts. ... the Riverside ... transit agency and air quality officials alike see the move toward zero emission electric buses as a natural evolution — especially in the Inland air basin, which this year failed to meet the federal health standard for smog during 94 days. But, for now, only two electric transit buses are on the road in the South Coast basin. They are operated by Foothill Transit, which serves the area generally between Pasadena and Claremont. Those buses were bought new from Proterra, a company based in Greenville, S.C. And UC Riverside uses an all-electric trolly for special events, said campus spokesman Sean Nealon. The vehicle was one of the first all-electric retrofits done by Complete Coach Works. Nikhil Parchure, electric vehicle specialist for the company, is a pioneer in electric bus technology. He helped the company put together its electric propulsion system for rebuilt buses. Several vendors develop each component of the system. Each bus uses nearly 30,000 lithium-ion battery cells, each a little more than a half inch in diameter and about two-and-half inches tall, They are similar to the rechargeable batteries now used to power laptop computers. One technical challenge was figuring out how to evenly distribute the power draw-down of thousands of batteries, Parchure said. To do so, the company had a vendor write special software. At Complete Coach Works’ Riverside facility in late October, a 14-year-old bus from Indianapolis was undergoing a metamorphosis. It had been stripped down to the metal chassis, and workers were installing light-weight flooring made from polyurethane foam sandwiched between layers of fiberglass. “We take them down to bare metal and take out all moving parts, and then build them back from the ground up,” said Scalzi, who has since left the company. Lighter flooring, low-resistance tires, LED lighting, and energy-efficient heating and cooling all help the bus go farther between charges. With a range of 130 miles, these buses can do a morning commuter route, charge during mid-day, and be ready to travel the same route during the evening rush hour, Scalzi said. Miyasato, the air district official, said he was impressed with the economics of these bus makeovers. By recycling old bus chassis, the company cuts the cost of replacing a diesel bus to about $550,000. An all-new electric bus costs more than $1 million. It’s still much cheaper — about $175,000 — to rebuild a bus that retains diesel technology. But Complete Coach Works argues that transit agencies will more than make up for the higher rebuilding cost through fuel and maintenance savings over the 12-year life of a bus. Electric charging costs about a fourth that of diesel fuels, and electric vehicles don’t need oil, transmission fluid or filters, according to the company. The order from Indiana’s transit agency, called IndyGo, put Complete Coach Works into a hiring mode, said Celeste Casa, its marketing director. In November, the company was accepting applications for 20 types of jobs, ranging from production supervisor to general laborer. Parchure said he expects battery technology to improve, allowing electric buses to go farther between charges. “Two-hundred and fifty miles is the Holy Grail,” he said. 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