On Tuesday, the City Council of Charlotte, N.C., approved a pilot program and public-private partnership between the Charlotte Area Transit System CATS) and eTransEnergy, a subsidiary of Duke Energy, to test the performance of battery electric bus vehicles across the greater metropolitan Charlotte area.
The partnership will test 18 BEB vehicles from three different manufacturers over the next 12- to 18-months. The collaboration is supported by the Bloomberg Philanthropies American Cities Climate Challenge.
“eTransEnergy will support CATS with workforce training, performance data, procurement, electrical service management, and installation of battery-charging infrastructure at CATS bus facilities,” said CATS CEO John Lewis.
During the pilot program, CATS will collect data and assess vehicle performance while preparing for future phases. The BEB vehicles are expected to be delivered to CATS by the end of 2021, with the pilot program starting in early 2022.
Six of the18 buses are funded through a $3.7 million Federal Transit Administration (FTA) Low or No (LoNo) Emissions Grant. The rest will be funded through CATS Capital Investment Program.
“We are excited to have developed a blueprint for public-private partnership with CATS to first pilot, then move to full-scale transit fleet electrification. We look forward to working with CATS and other transit authorities around the country to help them transition to clean energy transportation options,” said Greg Fields, Vice President of eTransEnergy.
Charlotte’s Strategic Energy Action Plan (SEAP) hopes to have city fleet and facilities fueled by 100 percent zero-carbon sources by 2030 and for the Charlotte community to be a low carbon city by 2050.
“Since 2018, the City of Charlotte has been working to achieve the vision of a low carbon Charlotte set forth in the SEAP,” said City of Charlotte Chief Sustainability Officer Sarah Hazel. “Though 2020 brought incredible challenges on many fronts, it also highlighted the importance of this work, which is why it is so exciting to take this collaborative step towards reaching the ambitious goals we set for ourselves and our community.”