The Golden Arrow Bus Services(GABS) electric bus project was officially launched at an event at the company’s Arrowgate Depot in Cape Town on Friday.
GABS has been testing electric buses in Cape Town since 2020 and first started using electric buses to carry passengers earlier this year.
The project, run in partnership with Smart EV, the EV charging division of STS Tech Group, saw the Arrowgate facility kitted out with modern charging technology and renewable energy infrastructure, EV-related hardware, and the security needed to support and secure this new fleet of electric buses.
Adding to the existing fleet of 1 200 diesel vehicles, the 12.5m-long, 65-seater BYD B12 electric buses are equipped with lithium-iron-phosphate batteries and have a range of around 300km.
With 60 buses currently being used across the city, GABS plans to increase its electric fleet to 120 by the end of the year.
At the launch event, attendees were shown the upgrades at the facility. This included increasing the City of Cape Town supply from 1MW to 3MW, redesigning the electrical infrastructure and metering onsite, deploying new EV chargers monitored through smart systems and setting up a 1.2-megawatt hour battery and inverter.
A dedicated fibre line, independent from Golden Arrow’s existing network, was installed to allow for smooth and reliable monitoring of the facility, explained Michael Leighton, Smart EV CTO.
Speaking from the Arrowgate control tower, Luqmaan Ryklief, a quality engineer at GABS, shared the importance of data across the facility. He highlighted how this information helps to manage energy consumption, for example.
The buses are set up to not charge during peak times and to utilise energy produced from the onsite solar during daytime charging, he explained. This is to manage their electricity budget.
“When it comes to electricity supply, there is a bit of a trade-off between how many buses we can charge and how many we want to charge. We could charge all the buses in 30 minutes using electricity from the grid but then we would receive a scary electricity bill,” he said.
According to Ryklief, the move to electric has already reduced the quantity of diesel the company uses, from 39 000 litres per day to 32 000.
“I’ve had the opportunity to visit big charging facilities in other countries around the world and this definitely is one of the best,” commented Gideon Neethling, company engineer for GABS.
“With the Smart EV system in place, we are saving energy and also using surplus solar power more strategically across the depot. When you’re running a facility of this size, you have to manage it with technology or you’ll be in big trouble. In the old days, people used to stand up there in the control room and manage everything manually but that’s not practical or realistic anymore,” he said.
“It is an absolute privilege to be part of something that is definitely changing the future of Golden Arrow,” said Neethling.“
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