Author : Christian Krelling
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (122 download)
Book Synopsis A Critical Assessment of CNG as an Alternative Fuel in Public Bus Transit in Delhi, India by : Christian Krelling
Download or read book A Critical Assessment of CNG as an Alternative Fuel in Public Bus Transit in Delhi, India written by Christian Krelling and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The rapid motorization of transport in Indian cities has led to the implementation of several policies to address motor vehicle emissions, including the conversion of city buses to run on compressed natural gas (CNG) from around the year 2000. As part of this conversion, Delhi Transport Corporation’s (DTC) more than 3,000 diesel buses were replaced by Standard (high-floor) CNG buses, and from 2007-08, nearly 4,000 low-floor CNG buses have replaced the Standard CNG buses. CNG has also been implemented in the public bus fleets in other Indian cities. To help assess the long-term desirability of replacing diesel with CNG in India and similar contexts, and for informing techno-economic and environmental analyses of CNG bus transit operations, I assess the operational and financial performance consequences of, and the cost-effectiveness of emissions reductions due to CNG implementation in Delhi, India. My research shows that CNG implementation caused a significant reduction in DTC’s capacity to deliver transit service in the initial stages of the fuel transition, and also necessitated investments in buses at a considerable cost premium relative to their diesel counterparts. Further, bus life-cycle costs (LCCs) are higher for CNG than for diesel, but CNG negatively affects the LCC of Standard buses proportionately more than for the low-floor buses, for which the LCC is already high. The cost-effectiveness analysis of CNG bus emissions reductions showed that, while Standard CNG buses, relative to their diesel counterparts, offered the most potential in reducing PM and CO2(e) emissions in the early 2000s, the most cost-effective choice in tackling these emissions would have been to upgrade to a new fleet of diesel buses running on lower sulphur fuel and using improved exhaust aftertreatment systems. Also, considering the current implementation of CNG in other Indian cities, my analysis suggests that the higher costs of CNG may not justify the environmental benefits compared to available cleaner diesel bus technologies.The broader question I raise is that the financial situation resulting from these effects due to CNG implementation in Delhi may have detracted from the ability to enhance transit capacity and provide transit service overall. My research also shows the critical importance of the fuel price and fuel economy of CNG, for the competitiveness of CNG relative to diesel buses, and demonstrates the need for careful fuel pricing policies when CNG is implemented in bus transit. Finally, I also demonstrated the need to analyze policies such as CNG implementation broadly, in terms of conflicts and trade-offs between environmental, and other (transit operation, socio-economic and equity) objectives, rather than narrowly in terms of only environmental outcomes"--
