California Buses must be electric by 2029

[BusHunter]

Was reading about California's new mandates that states, that buses in Cali will have be purchased as all electric by 2029. I know now buses have be hybrid out there, but this is really taking a step in an extreme direction. How will the TA's afford a complete electric fleet? I don't know what the L.A. fleet total is but it has to be up there with us. Probably if I was an electric bus manufacturer I would be basing my operation out there. On the flipside if I was a diesel manufacturer like Thor industries, i would be wanting to relocate unless I could change my operations to at least 50 percent electric manufacturing. They also recently stated they want all cars and trucks built after 2024 and sold in Cali to be electric there. I don't know how that will work. If I was a car dealer, I'd be basing my dealerships out of Vegas maybe offering free delivery within the Cali border, but the registrations would all have to be Nevada. It's circumventing the law and I don't if it's legal but it's a way to get around the problem. A good question would be can a bus company do the same? U-haul runs nationwide with Arizona plates. You may ask why but Arizona plates registrations are fairly cheap, 8 bucks, but they are hq in Phoenix. What they are doing is legal. Arizona has some really loose restrictions. I once saw an Arizona license, I used to be in the car rental business, that said it expired 2023. But this was back in the year 2000!! Kind of interesting to see what happens with this. Here's a few links:

Cali electric bus link:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/14/climate/california-electric-buses.html

U-Haul arizona plates link:

https://brokensecrets.com/2010/04/08/why-u-hauls-have-arizona-license-plates/

[artthouwill]

2 hours ago, BusHunter said:

Was reading about California's new mandates that states, that buses in Cali will have be purchased as all electric by 2029. I know now buses have be hybrid out there, but this is really taking a step in an extreme direction. How will the TA's afford a complete electric fleet? I don't know what the L.A. fleet total is but it has to be up there with us. Probably if I was an electric bus manufacturer I would be basing my operation out there. On the flipside if I was a diesel manufacturer like Thor industries, i would be wanting to relocate unless I could change my operations to at least 50 percent electric manufacturing. They also recently stated they want all cars and trucks built after 2024 and sold in Cali to be electric there. I don't know how that will work. If I was a car dealer, I'd be basing my dealerships out of Vegas maybe offering free delivery within the Cali border, but the registrations would all have to be Nevada. It's circumventing the law and I don't if it's legal but it's a way to get around the problem. A good question would be can a bus company do the same? U-haul runs nationwide with Arizona plates. You may ask why but Arizona plates registrations are fairly cheap, 8 bucks, but they are hq in Phoenix. What they are doing is legal. Arizona has some really loose restrictions. I once saw an Arizona license, I used to be in the car rental business, that said it expired 2023. But this was back in the year 2000!! Kind of interesting to see what happens with this. Here's a few links:

Cali electric bus link:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/14/climate/california-electric-buses.html

U-Haul arizona plates link:

https://brokensecrets.com/2010/04/08/why-u-hauls-have-arizona-license-plates/

Reading the article,  it says that starting in 2029, all purchases by TAs ib California must be first electric buses    Basically that means TAs ib Calu can still purchase diesel buses during the next 8 years.  Diesels are hybrids could gi for a decent price compared to electrics.  I would try to prolong buying electric as long as possible.   Thankfully those fleets don't have to be 109 percent electric by 2029.  

[strictures]

8 hours ago, artthouwill said:

Reading the article,  it says that starting in 2029, all purchases by TAs ib California must be first electric buses    Basically that means TAs ib Calu can still purchase diesel buses during the next 8 years.  Diesels are hybrids could gi for a decent price compared to electrics.  I would try to prolong buying electric as long as possible.   Thankfully those fleets don't have to be 109 percent electric by 2029.  

They could also string trolley wires for electric buses on very long routes.

[BusHunter]

9 hours ago, artthouwill said:

Reading the article,  it says that starting in 2029, all purchases by TAs ib California must be first electric buses    Basically that means TAs ib Calu can still purchase diesel buses during the next 8 years.  Diesels are hybrids could gi for a decent price compared to electrics.  I would try to prolong buying electric as long as possible.   Thankfully those fleets don't have to be 109 percent electric by 2029.  

But they do have to be 100 percent  by 2040. So if they buy a bunch of hybrids in 2028 they cant use them in 2040. I wonder where the diesel trains sit in all this? Another question would be does this apply to the charter companies based there. My company has electric buses but they are rare. Dont know if a coach bus/MCI exists in an all electric bus. The charters could base out of Arizona. Problem solved.

[strictures]

12 hours ago, BusHunter said:

But they do have to be 100 percent  by 2040. So if they buy a bunch of hybrids in 2028 they cant use them in 2040. I wonder where the diesel trains sit in all this? Another question would be does this apply to the charter companies based there. My company has electric buses but they are rare. Dont know if a coach bus/MCI exists in an all electric bus. The charters could base out of Arizona. Problem solved.

I read that Caltrain on the San Francisco peninsula is electrifying.

[MetroShadow]

7 hours ago, strictures said:

I read that Caltrain on the San Francisco peninsula is electrifying.

So trains aren't really included here. CalMod was a plan in motion since at least 2013.

We're now further behind due to predictable delays.

[MetroShadow]

On 7/4/2020 at 10:25 AM, BusHunter said:

Was reading about California's new mandates that states, that buses in Cali will have be purchased as all electric by 2029. I know now buses have be hybrid out there, but this is really taking a step in an extreme direction. How will the TA's afford a complete electric fleet? I don't know what the L.A. fleet total is but it has to be up there with us. Probably if I was an electric bus manufacturer I would be basing my operation out there. On the flipside if I was a diesel manufacturer like Thor industries, i would be wanting to relocate unless I could change my operations to at least 50 percent electric manufacturing. They also recently stated they want all cars and trucks built after 2024 and sold in Cali to be electric there. I don't know how that will work. If I was a car dealer, I'd be basing my dealerships out of Vegas maybe offering free delivery within the Cali border, but the registrations would all have to be Nevada. It's circumventing the law and I don't if it's legal but it's a way to get around the problem. A good question would be can a bus company do the same? U-haul runs nationwide with Arizona plates. You may ask why but Arizona plates registrations are fairly cheap, 8 bucks, but they are hq in Phoenix. What they are doing is legal. Arizona has some really loose restrictions. I once saw an Arizona license, I used to be in the car rental business, that said it expired 2023. But this was back in the year 2000!! Kind of interesting to see what happens with this. Here's a few links:

Cali electric bus link:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/14/climate/california-electric-buses.html

U-Haul arizona plates link:

https://brokensecrets.com/2010/04/08/why-u-hauls-have-arizona-license-plates/

So this is incorrect. Agencies should be buying electric by 2040 but many agencies can still buy diesel. Hybrids and CNG have been fine choices lately, but eventually all agencies need to submit a plan to replace their diesels by then. 

SamTrans has started to buy electrics but just received 55 XD60's. There was an issue with operations on whether or not electrics can handle the hills (they kinda do). AC Transit ordered hybrids for Tempo BRT (the 2300s) but ordered MCIs to replace the 6000's, the hydrogen and battery fleet with NF, and Gilligs have been a mixed group.

 The air resources board, the state, air districts, may have different funding streams to provide for that. 

And keep in mind we're not beholden to buy electrics vehicles for personal use. Not to my knowledge at least. The automakers might have an issue, still, because of the emissions standards being very strict...

[MetroShadow]

19 hours ago, BusHunter said:

But they do have to be 100 percent  by 2040. So if they buy a bunch of hybrids in 2028 they cant use them in 2040. I wonder where the diesel trains sit in all this? Another question would be does this apply to the charter companies based there. My company has electric buses but they are rare. Dont know if a coach bus/MCI exists in an all electric bus. The charters could base out of Arizona. Problem solved.

Charters and Intercity buses are exempt, as is Universities for now. MCI has an electric model out there, however, that Flixbus has tested between Berkeley/SF and Sacramento. 

[BusHunter]

7 minutes ago, MetroShadow said:

Charters and Intercity buses are exempt, as is Universities for now. MCI has an electric model out there, however, that Flixbus has tested between Berkeley/SF and Sacramento. 

Oh!! Well if you mean like greyhound when referring to intercity couldnt they just follow the emission guidelines of the state the hq is based. Yeah there are lots of buses in cali, like school buses. Electric is just scratching the surface in that industry. I believe though that all buses now have to be alternative fuel even those. I know in LA they run propane school buses. Do they currently run hybrid mci's' in cali?

[MetroShadow]

20 hours ago, BusHunter said:

Oh!! Well if you mean like greyhound when referring to intercity couldnt they just follow the emission guidelines of the state the hq is based. Yeah there are lots of buses in cali, like school buses. Electric is just scratching the surface in that industry. I believe though that all buses now have to be alternative fuel even those. I know in LA they run propane school buses. Do they currently run hybrid mci's' in cali?

Nope - no MCI Hybrids here (Houston does and NJ Transit), and AC Transit is ordering the CRT's (demo'ed here and here). Agencies should have a plan in place sooner, rather than later. But given the 12-year threshold for FTA purchased vehicles, 2028 would be the last year that diesel purchases can be made.

Here's the FlixBus demo project

As for other OTR coaches, Alexander Dennis is working on the electric double decker buses for Foothill Transit.  

[BusHunter]

I can see why intercity cant work cause 300 miles is nothing for an interstate vehicle. That's about 5 hrs of driving then what do you do tag team along the route. That would be a pain with luggage. They will need lots of grant money to pull this off even for the cities transportation. Alot of budgets dont have 10s of millions to spend on a bus. Might be cheaper to do retrofits if that's legal.

[andrethebusman]

City service you can probably get away with it. Hideously expensive, but then most unfunded mandates are, and CA has lots of them. Like the multi-engine switch engines UP and BNSF were forced to buy for local service in LA area about 10 years ago. Offloaded them the day the 10 year contract they had to sign to get state funding expired as they were basically maintenance intensive problems. So you can see state having to kick in for electric buses, which on their 12th birthday, to the day, get retired, as in 12 years certainly the "next generation" will be much better. No more buses hanging around 20-22 years as was common until 1990s.

[artthouwill]

9 minutes ago, andrethebusman said:

City service you can probably get away with it. Hideously expensive, but then most unfunded mandates are, and CA has lots of them. Like the multi-engine switch engines UP and BNSF were forced to buy for local service in LA area about 10 years ago. Offloaded them the day the 10 year contract they had to sign to get state funding expired as they were basically maintenance intensive problems. So you can see state having to kick in for electric buses, which on their 12th birthday, to the day, get retired, as in 12 years certainly the "next generation" will be much better. No more buses hanging around 20-22 years as was common until 1990s.

Going to see you posting again.

[Pace831]

The Verge: 15 States agree to follow California's new standards for electric vehicles.

[BusHunter]

On 7/15/2020 at 3:09 AM, Pace831 said:

The Verge: 15 States agree to follow California's new standards for electric vehicles.

Although in most states it's less strict than Cali. It still is hair raising. NYC has a giant system. Don't know how production can keep up with the demand. Proterra definitely needs a bigger factory cause it can barely fulfill the orders it has now. Even NFI, with all it's resources, couldn't fufill all those orders as it would mean over half of it's production is electric. Maybe in the future it could. Here if you did a 30 percent electric law that's still 600 buses just at the cta and operations with smaller budgets like Pace would most likely have a hard time meeting that quota. But on the flipside, if you really want to say we'll be all electric by 2040, you'll have to do a stairstep law that makes a higher percentage of buses to become electric each few years this way possibly you could make the goal. But there are things like the electric grid that can't handle all that power consumption because you would now make electric energy the most used commodity on the planet. That makes it fantasy to me, but perhaps solar power could be introduced, whether at the bus facility location or on the roofs of the buses, so we wouldn't be so dependent on the electric grid. Still there issues on snow and weather but if you heated the roofs... ??

[NewFlyerMCI]

6 hours ago, BusHunter said:

Although in most states it's less strict than Cali. It still is hair raising. NYC has a giant system. Don't know how production can keep up with the demand. Proterra definitely needs a bigger factory cause it can barely fulfill the orders it has now. Even NFI, with all it's resources, couldn't fufill all those orders as it would mean over half of it's production is electric. Maybe in the future it could. Here if you did a 30 percent electric law that's still 600 buses just at the cta and operations with smaller budgets like Pace would most likely have a hard time meeting that quota. But on the flipside, if you really want to say we'll be all electric by 2040, you'll have to do a stairstep law that makes a higher percentage of buses to become electric each few years this way possibly you could make the goal. But there are things like the electric grid that can't handle all that power consumption because you would now make electric energy the most used commodity on the planet. That makes it fantasy to me, but perhaps solar power could be introduced, whether at the bus facility location or on the roofs of the buses, so we wouldn't be so dependent on the electric grid. Still there issues on snow and weather but if you heated the roofs... ??

Pace certainly couldn’t do an all electric fleets. Some routes would thrive (Elgin routes, Naperville routes, Waukegan routes, etc) and other routes probably wouldn’t based on distance and/or frequency (330, 554, 250, 208, 386, 213, etc)

[BusHunter]

13 hours ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Pace certainly couldn’t do an all electric fleets. Some routes would thrive (Elgin routes, Naperville routes, Waukegan routes, etc) and other routes probably wouldn’t based on distance and/or frequency (330, 554, 250, 208, 386, 213, etc)

Pace would have to go with cheaper electric buses which means smaller eldorko type ones. Maybe they could cheat with more frequent service on a few routes that are borderline 40 footer. But with the heavy routes like #352, #270 or #318 or bus routes in the top 10 for ridership you would most certainly have to either buy a few 40 foot electrics and possibly mix in some electric retrofit buses just for a startup. Once the agencies feel the money savings, think of all that diesel your not buying, I believe the budget may sustain itself. It's just the startup is expensive. Like I said before if somehow they could run the buses on solar power or even windmill energy they could save even more but that's most likely the 2nd or 3rd level of electrification. If they had clean air Grant's to work with it might just work out.