NSW Electric Bus Plan

Sydney / New South Wales Transport Discussion
tonyp
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

boronia wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 4:52 pm Electric bus local manufacturing commitment a ‘mountain to climb’

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/ele ... 59k5l.html
Lucky for Nexport that the definition of "local build" seems so far to be rubbery enough to include the import of Chinese chassis. If that changes they'll have to do some fancy footwork. Anyway, all of the issues they raise are already being addressed in the NSW electric bus strategy. The SMH thinks it's onto a scoop.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by boronia »

And aren't they using ADL kits for the bodies?
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tonyp
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

boronia wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 5:07 pm And aren't they using ADL kits for the bodies?
They've been using locally built Gemilang so far, but, yes, they seem to have also struck some sort of deal with ADL.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by J_Busworth »

As mentioned in the STA thread, Custom Denning Elements 3122 and 3123 have both now entered service at State Transit Waverley.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by Linto63 »

tonyp wrote: Anyway, all of the issues they raise are already being addressed in the NSW electric bus strategy. The SMH thinks it's onto a scoop.
The SMH is hardly sensationalising, merely reporting facts. Andrew Constance started flapping his gums about Sydney having an all electric fleet by 2030 nearly 2 years ago. At that stage 800 buses would needed to be purchased every year. With only a couple of dozen purchased, that number is nearly 1,000. So a finger will need to be pulled if the target is to be met
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

Linto63 wrote: Thu Dec 30, 2021 12:40 pm The SMH is hardly sensationalising, merely reporting facts. Andrew Constance started flapping his gums about Sydney having an all electric fleet by 2030 nearly 2 years ago. At that stage 800 buses would needed to be purchased every year. With only a couple of dozen purchased, that number is nearly 1,000. So a finger will need to be pulled if the target is to be met
The finger has been pulled. That's exactly what the strategy team is working on already.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by Linto63 »

Does it really need a strategy team? Sounds like a typical government operation, lots of meetings, millions given to consultants to state the obvious and not a lot of action. Just needs a schedule for the infrastructure to be rolled out with the buses to follow.
tonyp
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

No it's much more than that. It includes the participation of the whole industry, covering issues such as production capacity and what direction it takes after the initial project has concluded.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

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TonyP this just does NOT sound like you.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

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Plenty of fact finding junkets to be had to ensure we get a 'world class' product. Sounds like a department trying to include the world and its wife in the process so it can share the blame for the cock-ups around.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

Fleet Lists wrote: Thu Dec 30, 2021 2:55 pm TonyP this just does NOT sound like you.
You mean somebody has hacked my ATDB profile? :shock:

Let TfNSW speak for itself then.

https://www.transport.nsw.gov.au/projec ... sion-buses

The industry has a huge job ahead, followed by a cliff. A lot of detailed planning is necessary. They wouldn't need much in the way of fact-finding, they're already well around most of the issues.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

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Very interesting reading particularly the pdf attachment https://www.transport.nsw.gov.au/system ... rategy.pdf
Of the six or seven types of buses listed (Including articulated buses) only the standard bus is currently available as an electric bus. So there still appears to be a lot of work that needs to be done to cover the other types. Or we will go back to one type of bus but small school buses need more suitable replacements.

At the rate of 8000 buses to be done from mid 2022 to 2030 virtually 20 buses a week or 1000 a year. Has the budgetary aspect of this been considered?

My previous point was that normally you are much more skeptical when governments propose such large exercises.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by moa999 »


tonyp wrote:
The industry has a huge job ahead, followed by a cliff. .
Which is one of the reasons why doing it in under 20yrs is stupid. If you want to invest in a local industry you need to make it sustainable for the long term.

I also suspect they will find it much more difficult than first though to get sufficient power into some depots.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by Merc1107 »

moa999 wrote: Thu Dec 30, 2021 5:17 pm
tonyp wrote:
The industry has a huge job ahead, followed by a cliff. .
Which is one of the reasons why doing it in under 20yrs is stupid. If you want to invest in a local industry you need to make it sustainable for the long term.
The cost of equipping the industry (as I assume they won't do this without a handout - such production levels are simply unsustainable once the huge procurement ceases) would have to be huge, too.

Then there's the issue of the long run as already mentioned - the usual trickling orders being barely adequate to keep more than a small handful of local manufacturers ticking away, even at the best of times. Will the electrification of other states be accomplished in turn after NSW so their glitzy, taxpayer funded facilities can still run at full capacity for decades? (This should obviously be taken as sarcasm - but realistically it's the only way you could keep the volume high in the long run).
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by Linto63 »

Fleet Lists wrote: At the rate of 8000 buses to be done from mid 2022 to 2030 virtually 20 buses a week or 1000 a year. Has the budgetary aspect of this been considered?
You would expect so, but this is government, so wouldn't put the house on it. With electric buses reportedly costing $1 million a piece, an $8 billion project, While you would expect the price of buses would come down a bit, there is also infrastructure costs to add in, so $8 billion is probably there or thereabouts.

Over 8 years would require $1 billion to be spent annually. To put in context, the total transport capital expenditure budget this year is $17 billion, although only $49 million is allocated for new buses.

The elephant in the room is that the original business case may have been done on the assumption that the Transport Asset Holding Entity would weave its magic to spirit away costs, but given the Auditor General's reservations in signing off on this, may not work as planned. Then there is what happens to the legacy diesel fleet, many of which will be only at half-life or better. You can bet the finance companies won't get caught holding buses nobody wants, so there may be further costs to pay out leases. Although this could be partially offset by them moving to regional operators that the government would otherwise need to finance new buses for.
moa999 wrote: Which is one of the reasons why doing it in under 20yrs is stupid. If you want to invest in a local industry you need to make it sustainable for the long term.

I also suspect they will find it much more difficult than first though to get sufficient power into some depots.
I'd be amazed if the project doesn't end up getting scaled back and / or its implementation timeframe extended.
Merc1107 wrote: The cost of equipping the industry (as I assume they won't do this without a handout - such production levels are simply unsustainable once the huge procurement ceases) would have to be huge, too.
Manufacturers will invest if they receive orders and can recover the cost of their investment. But they are not going to spend millions on the off-chance of winning contracts. Custom Bus and Volgren have both been stung by overcapitalising for orders that didn't eventuate or had insufficient profit margin to recover capital costs.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by Merc1107 »

Linto63 wrote: Thu Dec 30, 2021 8:28 pm Manufacturers will invest if they receive orders and can recover the cost of their investment. But they are not going to spend millions on the off-chance of winning contracts. Custom Bus and Volgren have both been stung by overcapitalising for orders that didn't eventuate or had insufficient profit margin to recover capital costs.
That's the problem, they must be allowed time to ramp up production - going from dribs and drabs to a thousand buses a year isn't something that will happen overnight, nor should I think something you'd start until there was a good, firm order. This does appear to have been given some consideration from what I've read thus far.

To make such an effort viable, though, will that result in a markup on the price of vehicles? Could it simply be better to organise a tenderer (or tenderers) to replace the 8000 as their time comes, rather than prematurely?
Linto63 wrote: Thu Dec 30, 2021 8:28 pm The elephant in the room is that the original business case may have been done on the assumption that the Transport Asset Holding Entity would weave its magic to spirit away costs, but given the Auditor General's reservations in signing off on this, may not work as planned. Then there is what happens to the legacy diesel fleet, many of which will be only at half-life or better. You can bet the finance companies won't get caught holding buses nobody wants, so there may be further costs to pay out leases.
Aside from what to do with unwanted diesels, what of the electrics as they age? At 1000 buses per annum, and assuming all last the full 15, 20, 25 years on the road, a similar Herculean effort will be needed again to replace all these buses. Or, they could start a rolling replacement from 2030 onwards - and now you're dealing with half-life electrics, probably with shot batteries at that age, with technology considered hopelessly outdated.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

Fleet Lists wrote: Thu Dec 30, 2021 4:29 pm
My previous point was that normally you are much more skeptical when governments propose such large exercises.
My personal opinion is that it has been caught up in this madness that we must achieve certain environmental objectives by a certain year or the world will end. I would spread it over twenty years to allow the diesel fleet to progressively life-expire and to maintain a steady workflow for new electric buses as the first ones complete their lifespan and require replacement. There would also be less pressure on manufacturers, on operators and on setting up the infrastructure and power supply. The other issue is that suddenly a standard (12 metre) bus is going to cost 50-100% more than it did. Admittedly there will be big whole-of-life savings that the operator will benefit from, but upfront, the taxpayer gets hit with a doubling of the cost of bus purchases. What's going to be sacrificed to pay for that, or will taxes be raised? Too much, too soon.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by Stonesourscotty »

Busways have an Element in Normal Nsw livery at Penrith Depot currently visible from outside the depot. Are 5 in Electric and 1 in Normal livery?
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by gilberations »

I notice a lot of, and I hate to call them this, but right wing anti-electric road vehicle talking points.

Reminder that NSW has seen this before. When we got rid of the trams. The oil lobby is trying to influence political discussion to show that electric is unreliable, too expensive, costs more upfront… etc.

The cost of the vehicle will come down as more manufacturers start production. The whole of life cost is lower for electric. The localized air pollution is better. And as the technology is embraced, it will be improved upon.

Remember, people used to say that cars where useless when we still used horses to transport the parts to make them! The same goes for the fact that there is still pollution from electricity generation so long as we use coal. Renewable generations are close.

The electric bus is good. It will be the way of the now as well as the future. Time to look at the positives and not the negatives.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

Oh no, the "right wing" bogeyman! No, there is no conspiracy. The solution that is most cost- effective and practical will win through in the end and industry (including the oil-related industry) will adapt to that, following the money as commerce does.

Electric transport has been around for more than 130 years (for the benefit of those who seem to think it's a new thing). It quickly took hold among the fixed route public and freight transport modes and has developed to a very sophisticated level. With road transport, all modern technology is derived from the long-scorned (out of ignorance) trolleybus. Even battery-electric propulsion developed on trolleybuses (and trams) before it became the "latest thing". Nobody has ever questioned the legitimacy of electric traction, just ignored it until its recent sudden (re) "discovery".

The reasons for questioning the current spread of electric traction into non-fixed transport modes are practicality and cost, both legitimate and age-old questions that anybody is entitled to ask about any technological change. Unfortunately we're now regressing into a new age of dogmas where questioning and debate have become heresy.

If we can't debate those legitimate questions with proper informed responses, then we will end up with a poorer product for which somebody (typically taxpayers and especially the poorer end of society - the "working class" to use an older term) bears the additional costs. In that event, the sections of society that can least afford to participate in the benefits of those advances subsidise those wealthy enough to afford them, electric cars and solar electricity systems, with their public subsidies funded by all taxpayers regardless of their personal wealth, are a prime example.

So that's one reason why these "right wing" bogeymen are questioning the issues and in doing so are standing up for the "working class" whom the left side of politics have latterly abandoned.

So we now have buses costing up to twice as much as diesel buses that taxpayers (that's all taxpayers regardless of personal wealth, remember) have to pay for. Yes, that's certainly offset in the long term by lower WOL costs, but the taxpayer gets the hit of the upfront and the operator gets the benefit of the WOL. Maybe that will lead to lower contract fees in the future, who knows?

For the car and CV owner, there's a big personal hit. I started my working life in the automotive industry and became closely familiar with the electric traction industry. One thing I've seen is that cost of electric traction systems, even in sectors where it's widely used, has not come down a lot over the years. Electric systems are expensive and I don't know that that's going to change too much. Batteries have added an additional complication to that, both in cost and lifespan - not saying that won't get better.

On the other side of the coin, we have the development of the cheap petrol engine which has opened up car ownership to the masses (including that pesky working class), so we're looking at the prospect of the poorer end of society being deprived of car ownership, or only being able to get a car that is too small for their family for the same money. That carries huge political implications as past election results show (remember the name Shorten, erstwhile champion of the working class?). From the manufacturer's standpoint, the margins on cheap cars are tight. The cheap petrol engine has enabled them to keep producing them. They'll happily jump on board the electric revolution because there's more profit in expensive cars that are more expensive to produce. The baseline price of electric cars will creep down, but we'll see the end off the sub/slightly above $20,000 car. The second hand market will also be killed by the life- expired battery issue, with replacement battery packs currently coming in at around $20,000.

Finally, the other thing those irritating questioning "right wingers" are on about is practicality. Electric cars can work well if you live the city life (which is undesirable because the last thing we need in cities is more cars!), but outside the cities, the negatives really pile up at present. That may progressively change, but at present, vehicle electrification is up against matching the tough benchmark of being able to travel 700-1,000 km and only taking 5 minutes to "recharge" for another 700-1,000 km. The significance of that is completely underrated in the debate, but it could end up reflected in the price of commodities you consume, like the food on your table.

So in summary, increased electrification is a great and desirable development (provided that ample, reliable and cheap power is the backstop behind it and that's another subject that can also benefit from questioning and debate). However, we have to approach it in a sensible and structured way, such that it doesn't impoverish sectors of society who can least afford things. Setting it up as a quasi religious dogma and insulting and suppressing anybody trying to debate or question it is not the way to go. Try listening to what those "right wingers" have to say and argue them with facts, not speculation or ridicule. Then find a middle path that addresses all the issues for all sections of society. Otherwise people will inevitably see it as a gigantic wealth transferral scheme from the poor to the rich, which is the way it's starting to look at the moment.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by moa999 »

Think the war (it was pretty darn short) is over. We are getting electric buses (far more rapidly than ever happened with gas).

The only question up for debate is the split between foreign and local manufacturing.
And if we do have a substantial portion of local orders (which seems likely), will they be designed to establish a sustainable industry rather than boom/bust.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by boronia »

Was the "complete replacement by 2030" just another of Constance's brain farts?

Now that he has gone, will we see a more realistic timeline?
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by Linto63 »

Was announced when the more progressive moderate faction of the Liberal Party held the reins. Now that the party has taken a lurch to the right in its leadership, it may be less interested in issues that it perceives to be of the left.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

Post by tonyp »

moa999 wrote: Sun Jan 09, 2022 9:22 am Think the war (it was pretty darn short) is over. We are getting electric buses (far more rapidly than ever happened with gas).

The only question up for debate is the split between foreign and local manufacturing.
And if we do have a substantial portion of local orders (which seems likely), will they be designed to establish a sustainable industry rather than boom/bust.
Er, we've had electric buses since the late 19th century and particularly since the 1920s. Probably initially more rapidly than motor buses in fact. The war was over before you were born (assuming you're under 100!). It's simply entered a new phase off the back of technological advances made since the 1990s in the trolleybus and tram industries.
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Re: NSW Electric Bus Plan

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boronia wrote: Sun Jan 09, 2022 9:54 am Was the "complete replacement by 2030" just another of Constance's brain farts?

Now that he has gone, will we see a more realistic timeline?
Let's hope so. The present approach is not good for any stakeholder except those who want the environment "fixed up" by 2030 or whatever fanatical deadline has been set.
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