Modeling Urban Bus Fuel Consumption in Shanghai, China, Based on Localized MOVES

In China, urban bus energy consumption is an increasing concern due to system expansion and poor energy efficiency due to frequent stopping and starting by buses. This study develops a mesoscopic bus energy consumption model based on the U.S. Environment Protection Agency’s Motor Vehicle Emission Simulator (MOVES). To localize MOVES, link operating mode distribution is calculated by bus GPS data collected from nine routes in Shanghai, China. A comparison of bus fuel economy between the U.S.A. and China is conducted to determine the model years in U.S.A. and China which have similar fuel consumption performance for buses with a certain weight. After MOVES localization, link energy consumption factors are estimated, and then the impacts of average speed, vehicle stops, acceleration, and road facility on link energy consumption factors are explored. Based on this exploration of influential variables, this study develops link-level bus energy consumption factor look-up tables for a variety of bus types. Model validation indicates that using link-level indicators to estimate bus energy consumption can achieve acceptable accuracy, and that the link type classification method can influence the accuracy of the mesoscopic bus energy consumption model. This study is useful to estimate bus energy consumption when instantaneous speed data is unavailable. This study also explores the extended application of MOVES by offering a procedure for applying MOVES to develop a bus energy consumption model in regions beyond the U.S.A.