In Wenatchee, Washington, Link Transit chose wireless charging for electric buses way back in 2018. According to Momentum Dynamics, which provided the wireless charging solutions, the choice was made in part due to the high efficiency of its system.
The key selling point, naturally, is this allowed an electric bus to drive with essentially unlimited range thanks to automatic opportunity charging along the bus’s route. While stopping for passengers, the buses were collecting energy as well.
Wireless charging delivers partial charging from a ground pad to a receiver completely automatically to the zero-emission bus without the need for cables.
This enables a bus to be charged throughout the day while on its scheduled route without interruption.
Momentum notes that even during the cold 2019–2020 winter weather, a Wenatchee bus featuring the wireless system ran a 14-hour scheduled route and maintained its battery charge above 90% the whole way through the journey.
The news now is that 50 MWh of energy have now been transmitted wirelessly for these electric buses in Wenatchee, Washington.
This could be a key solution for quicker adoption of electric bus fleets. Working as an error-free system, the vehicles have a range effectively exceeding even diesel buses.
The buses return to the depot with an almost full battery and in turn need much less charging overnight. It follows that the depot’s electricity demand causes much less stress on the electric utility as well.
Reference- Momentum Dynamics Online Newsroom, Electrek, InsideEVs, Clean Technica