Revolutionizing E-Bus Fleet Management
In response to the urgent need for decarbonization in the road transportation sector, the IMPULSE project has emerged as an initiative aimed at tackling the challenges of managing e-bus fleets. With road transport accounting for a significant portion of greenhouse gas emissions in Europe, the transition to zero-emission vehicles is crucial to achieving the defined goals.
The project comes in to tackle challenges arising from the increasing need for e-buses, driven by stricter CO2 emission targets and the European Commission’s mandate for all new urban buses to be zero-emission by 2030. However, the widespread adoption of e-buses faces obstacles such as battery limitations, long charging times, and inadequate charging infrastructure.
IMPULSE seeks to overcome these challenges through advanced data-driven optimization strategies tailored to the day-to-day operations of e-bus fleets. By integrating real-time information on battery status, service planning, and transport network characteristics, the platform enables precise real-time monitoring and predictive analytics to ensure efficient fleet management.
Starting in April, two pilot cases will be conducted in Lisbon (Portugal) and Kadıköy (Turkey), allowing for the validation and scalability of the solution across diverse European contexts. In Lisbon, the platform will be tested on a large fleet of e-buses operating in the city’s public transport service, while in Kadıköy, it will optimize the operation of a small fleet of mini-shuttles providing social public transport services.
By optimizing charging schedules based on energy consumption, charging windows, among others, IMPULSE aims to minimize service interruptions and operational costs for Public Transport Operators (PTOs), thus fostering the electrification of bus fleets. Thanks to the comparison of current data and past data, the team will be able to make predictions about whether the batteries’ status is sufficient for vehicles to complete the assigned routes and enable decision-making to reduce transport service interruptions and improve benefits.
The project represents a step forward to achieve sustainable and efficient urban mobility, working for a greener transportation system in Europe. CARNET plays a key role as leaders of the project and actively participating in the evaluation of pilots. The IMPULSE project is supported by EIT Urban Mobility, an initiative of the European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT), a body of the European Union.
