Bus Market

Features & Benefits

Fuel cell buses offer numerous compelling advantages over conventional diesel powered buses:

Zero Tail Pipe Emissions
Fuel cell buses emit only water vapour, eliminating air pollutants such as nitrogen oxides, sulphur oxides and particulate matter (PM) and making them an ideal solution for fulfilling regulatory requirements.

The use of hydrogen in a fuel cell bus can also significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions on a “well to wheel” basis, when compared to conventional technologies.

Reduced Operating Cost
Fuel cells are two to three times more efficient than combustion engines, converting more of the fuel’s energy into motive power which offers the potential to reduce overall fuel costs. And fuel cells and electric drive systems have no moving parts, which can reduce engine wear and maintenance costs.

Reliability
With over 2 million kilometers (or over 1.2 million miles) of actual transit bus revenue service, and over 6 million passengers, the 39 buses powered by Ballard’s P5 heavy-duty fuel cell module have demonstrated a corrected availability of greater than 95%. One of the operators in the Clean Urban Transportation for Europe (CUTE) program stated that "the fuel cell buses operated in Luxembourg have shown the same reliability as our diesel bus fleet."

Noise Reduction
The quiet electrical operation of the fuel cell bus makes it an ideal solution for operation in dense urban centres.

Improved Performance
A powerful electric motor ensures quiet and effortless acceleration and greater hill-climbing ability, which translates into increased customer satisfaction. Not only do customers appreciate the benefits of fuel cell buses, but bus drivers themselves rate performance positively.

Transit buses are a superb way to showcase the benefits of fuel cell technology to large constituencies of interested people who will then begin to more clearly envision the use of fuel cell technology for mass transit – and other – large-scale applications. Transit buses offer these positive application attributes -

• the size and weight of a transit bus can easily accommodate new technologies
• the fuel cell module is compatible with existing electric deive technology powering diesel and gasoline hybrid buses today
• transit buses are centrally fueled and maintained by professional drivers and maintenance staff
• government funding is available to support the higher cost of the new technology
• transit buses typically operate on fixed routes in urban areas, a favourable duty cycle for fuel cells