Electric Buses In India

Why India needs electric vehicle public transport?

Could a mass adoption of EVs help India fight rising pollution? India has some of the most polluted cities in the world with the recent winter smog in Delhi reaching hazardous proportions and blanketing the city in poisonous smog. Even small children were seen wearing pollution masks while on their way to school. The government reaction has mostly been ad-hoc and perfunctory in nature without any long term solution to the pollution which is said to be causing millions of deaths due to respiratory diseases.

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China which also faces a similar situation has been trying to find long term solutions for a much longer time. One of the most successful achievements of the Chinese government has been to convert almost 200,000 buses into electric. This not only saves a huge amount of fuel but also sharply reduces pollution amongst other EV advantages. Though the overall effect is not big given that electricity in China is powered by thousands of thermal power stations, this will improve going forward as the country moves towards renewable energy sources such as the wind, solar and hdyro.

High Battery cost should not remain a deterrent for long

India too is now looking to replicate the Chinese performance by increasing the penetration of electric vehicle buses in India. One of the biggest hurdles for electric buses is the high initial cost of the battery which dissuades buyers from buying electric buses. A 300 kWh battery on a bus can cost almost $100,000-$120,000 which is just too high. The government in India wants to remove this hurdle by promoting buses with a much small battery of around 50 kWh (about the same as in a high-end Tesla). Though the range of the bus will be sharply reduced, it can be countered by setting up more battery stations and given that a bus route is pretty much fixed.

A 50 kWh battery would cost around $20,000 (around INR 13 lakhs) which is not that high and could persuade bus fleet owners to switch to electric buses. If the government gives some incentives then electric buses would become quite prevalent across the country. With the battery costs expected to fall in half over the next 5 years, this problem should also disappear.