An analysis of the retail and lifecycle cost of battery-powered electric vehicles

Regulators, policy analysts, automobile manufacturers, environmental groups, and others are debating the merits of policies regarding the development and use of battery-powered electric vehicles (BPEVs). At the crux of this debate is lifecycle cost: the annualized initial vehicle cost, plus annual operating and maintenance costs, plus battery replacement costs. To address this issue of cost, we have developed a detailed model of the performance, energy use, manufacturing cost, retail cost, and lifecycle cost of electric vehicles and comparable gasoline internal-combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs). This effort is an improvement over most previous studies of electric vehicle costs because instead of assuming important parameter values for such variables as vehicle efficiency and battery cost, we model these values in detail. We find that in order for electric vehicles to be cost-competitive with gasoline ICEVs, batteries must have a lower manufacturing cost, and a longer life, than the best lithium-ion and nickel–metal hydride batteries we modeled. We believe that it is most important to reduce the battery manufacturing cost to $100/kWh or less, attain a cycle life of 1200 or more and a calendar life of 12 years or more, and aim for a specific energy of around 100 Wh/kg.     

Improved modeling of park‐and‐ride transfer time: Capturing the within‐day dynamics

An important factor that affects park‐and‐ride demand is transfer time. However, conventional park‐and‐ride demand models treat transfer time as a single value, without considering the time‐of‐day effect. Since early comers usually occupy spots closer to the entrance, their transfer times are shorter. Hence, there is a relationship between arrival time and transfer time. To analyze this relationship, a micro‐simulation model is developed. The model simulates the queuing system at the entrance and the pattern that parking spots are occupied in the parking lot over time. As expected, the model output illustrates an increasing relationship between arrival time and transfer time. This relationship has significant implication in mode choice models because it means that the attractiveness of park‐and‐ride depends on the time of arrival at the park‐and‐ride lot. This model of park‐and‐ride transfer time can potentially improve travel demand forecasting, as well as facilitate the operation and design of park‐and‐ride facilities.     

Passenger route guidance system for multi‐modal transit networks

In many public transport oriented cities in the world, especially Asian cities, the public transport system has been developed extensively, to the extent that it has become increasingly difficult to navigate. Although inter‐modal transfers are common and often necessary, a complete set of the routes across transport modes is generally not presented in a form that is accessible to travelers, as each operator would only publish its own routes. Moreover, the common nonlinear fare tables together with inter‐modal fare discounts pose challenges to travelers in deciding their best routes. This study develops a multi‐modal passenger route guidance system, called eFinder, to aid travelers with their combined mode‐route choices. We discuss the architecture and features of this system in this study. This system forms a platform for disseminating public transit information and should complement further development and use of the public transport network by enabling travelers to make informed choices.     

Tradeoffs in incremental changes towards pedestrian-friendly environments: Physical activity and pollution exposure

A microsimulation of individuals’ activities is used in the context of a risk analysis framework to assess the impacts of hypothesized changes to the built environment on personal energy expenditure and on inhalation of air pollutants. Uncertainty is assessed using Monte Carlo simulations and sensitivity analyzes. We find both simulated individuals that augment and others that reduce their energy expenditure and inhalation dose of pollutants, with median increases displaying larger magnitudes than the decreases. Up to 75% of the population has significant increases in energy expenditure and pollutant inhalation. We also find, however, high uncertainty associated with the estimates. Results differ considerably depending on the travel mode choice model used in the simulation.     

Postembryonic stages of Nucellicola holmanae Lamb et al., 1996 (copepoda, poecilostomatoida), an endoparasite of the dog whelk Nucella lapillus (gastropoda)

The external morphology of the first three larval stages of Nucellicola holmanae is described. These stages were cultured from eggs found with the adults in the viscera of dog whelks collected from Robin Hood's Bay, North Yorkshire. The nauplius develops within the whelk. It moults to a metanauplius which is released as a free-swimming stage. The metanauplius moults to a free copepodid stage which exhibits a combination of characters typical of the first, second and third copepodid stages of other poecilostomatoid copepods. The infective copepodid stage which locates and penetrates the host is visible through the integument of this free-swimming copepodid.     

An object-oriented approach to transport modelling: Software development to calculate road traffic noise

A framework for developing object-oriented software in transport modelling in proposed and demonstrated with the implementation of the calculation of road traffic noise (CORTN). Major tasks in the life cycle of an object-oriented development process are identified, and illustrated with the implementation of TRANSOOP – a software library containing 33,000 lines of C++ programming code. Software re-use from this library to produce a object-oriented noise program is compared with conventional computer programming shows that almost 90 per cent of the lines of code were drawn from TRANSOOP. Advantages of the object-oriented approach are discussed.