Hybrid Electric School Bus Deployment and Evaluation

Principal Investigator:

Shauna Hallmark, shallmar@iastate.edu (other projects)

Co-Principal Investigator:

• Dennis Kroeger, kroeger@iastate.edu (other projects)

Project Status: In Progress

Start Date: 07/01/2006
End Date: 06/30/2009

Related Publications:

• Demonstrating the feasibility of hybrid electric school buses, CTRE en Route, 08/30/2006

Research Objective: In recent years, several studies have been released detailing the negative public health impacts of vehicle emissions on young children and even demonstrating the amount of pollutants present in and around vehicles such as school buses. One such study indicated that the pollutant levels inside buses are actually higher than outside the buses.

The deployment of hybrid electric school buses in Iowa has the potential to produce significant impacts on the air quality, petroleum usage, and economic strength of the state while providing substantial health benefits to Iowa.

The Iowa research team consists of CTRE, the Iowa Department of Education, the Iowa Association of School Boards, and the school districts of Nevada and Signourney-Keota. The Iowa contingent is part of a larger consortium, Advanced Energy based in North Carolina, that is advancing the purchase of these buses nationwide.

CTRE will evaluate the technology deployed in Iowa and help collect data for the consortium. For the Iowa buses, CTRE will compare the actual emissions characteristics of the hybrid buses to standard diesel buses. CTRE will also evaluate the cost effectiveness of the hybrid electric school buses.

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