Development of a Hybrid Electric Mid-Sized Bus for Urban Transport

Hybrid vehicles acquired substantial importance with the advantages that are offered in terms of fuel consumption and emitted pollutants. There are several hybrid vehicle concepts developed for passenger cars mostly specialized with fuel efficient strategies in the market and more control schemes are still in the development process. Mid sized hybrid-buses, as a commonly used transport vehicle in urban traffic, can also be optimized with enhanced emission characteristics as well as with better fuel consumption performance. The objective of this paper is to summarize the evaluation of the project related to the development of a hybrid bus vehicle concept operating for urban transport: The development of control strategies, sizing of new traction and energy storage components, developing new concepts and strategies to handle the secondary power consuming devices on the mid-bus like air brakes or hydraulic steering system, emission measurement tests are the main steps of the development procedure.