Recommendations from Fleets Go Green

Abstract

Electric vehicles have the potential to reduce emissions from road transport, while releasing no local emissions during the use phase. The utilization of electric vehicles in fleet operations offers an excellent opportunity for the rapid diffusion of electric vehicles into the market due to the fast turnover rate of fleet vehicles. However, further research is necessary to examine the utilization of electric vehicles in daily use in order to recognize drawbacks and to determine further improvement potentials. The project Fleets Go Green aims to study the environmental assessment of electric vehicles in fleet operations. Fleets Go Green consists of different research modules, which investigate the integrated vehicle, usage, and power supply system behavior. The total energy requirements of fleet vehicle operations with different topologies over the use phase are determined in Module 1, while the user acceptance both from fleet owners and from drivers perspectives are researched in Module 2. Module 3 aims to integrate the electric vehicle fleets in the electrical distribution system and maximize the integration of renewable energy sources in their supply. The environmental assessment of fleets is studied in Module 4. Furthermore, all findings are integrated into a decision support system for the ecologically oriented fleet management and planning in Module 5.