Assessing the Feasibility of Hydrogen and Electric Buses for Urban Public Transportation using Rooftop Integrated Photovoltaic Energy in Cuenca Ecuador †

Antonia Cevallos-Escandón, Edgar Antonio Barragan-Escandón, Esteban Zalamea-León, Xavier Serrano-Guerrero, Julio Terrados-Cepeda

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

A main restriction of renewables from intermittent sources is the mismatch between energy resource availability and energy requirements, especially when extensive power plants are producing at their highest potential causing huge energy surpluses. In these cases, excess power must be stored or curtailed. One alternative is increasing urban solar potential which could be integrated to feed electric buses directly or alternatively through hydrogen (H2) as an energy vector. H2 from renewable electricity can be stored and used directly or through fuel cells. This study aims to determine the H2 capability that could be achieved when integrating large-scale photovoltaic (PV) generation in urban areas. This analysis was carried out by determining the PV energy potentially generated by installing PV in Cuenca City downtown (Ecuador). Cuenca is in the process of adopting renewal of the public transport vehicle fleet, introducing a new model with an electric tram main network combined with “clean type buses”. The conventional diesel urban transport could be replaced, establishing a required vehicle fleet of 475 buses spread over 29 routes, emitting 112 tons of CO2 and burning 11,175 gallons of diesel daily. Between the main findings, we concluded that the electricity that could be produced in the total roof area exceeds the actual demand in the study area by 5.5 times. Taking into account the energy surplus, it was determined that the available PV power will cover from 97% to 127% of the total demand necessary to mobilize the city bus fleet. The novelty of this work is the proposal of a combined methodology to find the potential to feed urban transport with urban solar power in cities, close to the equatorial line.

Original languageEnglish
Article number5569
JournalEnergies
Volume16
Issue number14
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This work is part of the research project “Sistema energético andaluz y prospective energética 2050. Analisis de políticas y medidas de mitigación del cambio climático en Andalucia”, and the research project “Ecosistema Sostenible de Movilidad Eléctrica para la Ciudad de Cuenca”.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 by the authors.

Keywords

  • city integrated photovoltaics
  • energy vector
  • environment
  • hydrogen
  • hydrogen fuel cells
  • renewable energies

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Assessing the Feasibility of Hydrogen and Electric Buses for Urban Public Transportation using Rooftop Integrated Photovoltaic Energy in Cuenca Ecuador †'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this