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Arriva drives green mobility with future-ready power infrastructure at Merseyside bus depot
04 March 2021
Arriva was seeking a partner with strong sustainability credentials to design and install the electrical infrastructure to deliver an industrial supply at its depot in Green Lane, Merseyside. The project aim was to provide reliable and secure electricity supply for six double bus chargers on a charging island in the middle of the depot.
Arriva Merseyside is a public transport operator running bus services in and around the Liverpool City Region, providing public transport services to the nearly 1.5 million local residents.
Arriva is committed to making its business carbon neutral by 2030 and reduce its impact on air quality in the urban centres where its services operate.
In 2018, Arriva Merseyside purchased 12 Enviro Buses, BYD ADL Enviro200EV single deck pure electric buses to serve some of the bus routes in Liverpool’s city centre. The e-buses joined the 51 hybrid and nine gas buses already added to the fleet earlier that year. This was the introduction of the final part of a £21 million investment into cutting edge green technology from Arriva Merseyside. The purchase was also supported through a successful £5 million bid for Government (OLEV) funding for new, greener buses, in partnership with Arriva.
The challenge
Arriva were seeking a partner with strong sustainability credentials to design and install the electrical infrastructure to deliver an industrial supply at the depot in Green Lane, Merseyside. The project aim was to provide reliable and secure electricity supply for six double bus chargers on a charging island in the middle of the depot.
A key goal was to minimise disruption to normal bus services during the installation process. The electrical infrastructure provider would be required to work in close collaboration with both the charger manufacturer and the local network operator, to ensure all components of the new system met the required regulatory standards as well as Arriva’s Health & Safety policy for people on site.
The solution itself was required to be highly durable and withstand all weather in its outdoor location, whilst having a minimal footprint as space is at a premium in the Green Lane depot.
With Arriva’s commitment towards emissions-free operations, the charging infrastructure would need to have capacity to grow the number of electric buses it services in the future.
The solution
The project began with a comprehensive consultation process with Arriva Merseyside, technology and utilities partners and Schneider Electric, led by its Power Consultancy team. The parties then designed, installed and manufactured an 11kV packaged substation in a configuration tailored to the project requirements.
Key features included the implementation of a low voltage MCCB feeder pillar, RN2c T2/21 ring main unit (RMU), and transformer to step down the supply to 415v as required by the chargers. The MCCB feeder pillar featured ComPact NS circuit breakers at 1600A to enable built-in power and energy metering functionalities through embedded MicroControl units. The direct coupling used in the substation design meant the product required minimal cabling to be installed and will require minimal maintenance over its lifetime, reducing overall cost.
The 11kV packaged substation, including switchgear and transformer, is manufactured in Schneider Electric’s plant in Leeds under a direct and controlled factory assembly, making the overall product incredibly safe. The packaged substation offer is consistent with Arriva Merseyside’s environmental commitment, having been manufactured to meet the ISO 14001 environmental standards.
The substation was installed on the depot’s land near the perimeter of the site, making the most effective use of space available in the urban location. This was possible due to the highly durable design of the components. The MCCB feeder pillar, designed for the UK market, is fully compliant with ISO 12924 standard to ensure that components will not rust even when constantly exposed to the elements for years.
The unit also has capacity to support a larger number of chargers, should Arriva Merseyside decide to expand the all-electric portion of its fleet in future – without further expansion of the depot’s power infrastructure.
The depot now has two separate power supplies, providing back up capability where required to ensure Arriva has even greater resiliency of supply.
The result
Arriva Merseyside now has a safe, reliable and convenient charging infrastructure in place for the 12 electric buses in its Merseyside fleet. Continuous achievement of 100% uptime and a charge time of 4-6 hours allows buses to be charged overnight, which is convenient, efficient, and cost-effective. Using this system, Arriva Merseyside can now operate its first all-electric bus route in Merseyside.
Arriva Merseyside now has the capacity to scale the number of chargers at the Green Lane depot going forwards, to accelerate its progress towards its carbon neutral 2030 goal. The shift towards more electrified public transport is expected to combat air pollution in the local area, as well as take Arriva one step closer to its company-wide carbon neutral goal.
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