Report: Philadelphia’s Electric Bus Fleet in Complete Shambles
By Paul Homewood
More than two dozen electric Proterra buses first unveiled by the city of Philadelphia in 2016 are already out of operation, according to a WHYY investigation.
The entire fleet of Proterra buses was removed from the roads by SEPTA, the city’s transit authority, in February 2020 due to both structural and logistical problems—the weight of the powerful battery was cracking the vehicles’ chassis, and the battery life was insufficient for the city’s bus routes. The city raised the issues with Proterra, which failed to adequately address the city’s concerns.
The city paid $24 million for the 25 new Proterra buses, subsidized in part by a $2.6 million federal grant. Philadelphia defended the investment with claims that the electric buses would require less maintenance than standard combustion engine counterparts.
"There’s a lot less moving parts on an electric bus than there is on an internal combustion engine," SEPTA chief Jeffrey Knueppel said in June 2019. Knueppel retired from the post just months later.
Proterra, which had Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm on its board of directors when Philadelphia pulled the buses off the streets last year, has been highlighted by the Biden administration as a business of the future. President Joe Biden visited the company’s factory in April and pledged in his initial infrastructure package proposal to include federal money for the electric vehicle market. The company has since been touted by top officials including White House climate adviser Gina McCarthy, who in a public meeting asked Proterra’s CEO how the federal government could spur demand for Proterra buses.
The cost of Proterra’s electric buses has gained attention in recent weeks. On a recent trip by Biden to La Crosse, Wis., it was revealed that two buses the city ordered from Proterra for $1.5 million in 2018 have still not been delivered. Over the past five days, Proterra’s stock price has fallen over 25 percent.
Philadelphia’s Proterra buses were first rolled out for the 2016 DNC convention with a promise that the city was "plugging into an emissions free future."
Granholm was on Proterra’s board from 2017 until earlier this year. It was during that time that both SEPTA and Proterra learned that the heavier buses were cracking, according to the WHYY report.
Philadelphia placed the Proterra buses in areas where it thought they could succeed but quickly learned it was mistaken. Two pilot routes selected in South Philadelphia that were relatively short and flat compared with others in the city were too much for the electric buses.
"Even those routes needed buses to pull around 100 miles each day, while the Proterras were averaging just 30 to 50 miles per charge," WHYY reporter Ryan Briggs wrote. "Officials also quickly realized there wasn’t room at the ends of either route for charging stations."
Similar problems have been found in other cities that partnered with Proterra. Duluth, Minn., which, like Philadelphia, waited three years for its Proterra buses to be delivered, ultimately pulled its seven buses from service "because their braking systems were struggling on Duluth’s hills, and a software problem was causing them to roll back when accelerating uphill from a standstill," according to the Duluth Monitor.
Proterra did not respond to a request for comment.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Tales of woe repeated in many many places. Where I live their small fleet of hybrid gas turbine buses were pulled out of service and converted to diesel
I daresay that the batteries will be showing up on eBay or batteryhookup.com.
Bath, UK electric buses were taken out of service as they didn’t perform…
The batteries are already on eBay
The green movement forgets that our current vehicle development is the result of 120 years of continuous improvement. Clearly We are trying to run before we can walk with the current technology.
These people act as though they are unaware that we have 120 years of experience, expecting actresses, pop singers (of dubious quality) and nouveau celebrities to suggest ‘one stage’ ideas, certain of success, when any Engineer would want to evaluate intermediate results and limit the cost of failure.
These people have a deficient dictionary: it’s missing the word ‘prototyping’.
“… $24 million for the 25 new Proterra buses …”
They could have started with two or three buses on a short route, not try it across multiple districts, in multiple countries, and multiple countries. Just like the UK’s overall NET Zero Carbon (Dioxide) Emissions plan: there isn’t one!
Maybe their plan is to fail, spectacularly, so it’s in at the deep end, protected by the Legacy Media propaganda, while the sheep look on …
There’s no other logical explanation.
They think like kids in a toy shop, and their toys are even less durable.
It is easy to be on the bleeding edge of development when you are spending other people’s money, and the consequences fall on the poor people in Philadelphia waiting for the bus.
Public transit is the elite’s sandbox. They don’t care whom they hurt.
At least it matches the rest of Philadelphia.
“There’s a lot less moving parts on an electric bus than there is on an internal combustion engine,” SEPTA chief Jeffrey Knueppel said.
And no moving parts at all when it is taken out of service.
Why would you buy a fleet of 25 buses of such a novel design rather than buying just one and seeing how well it performed? If they cost nearly a million dollars each, how does that compare with the price of an ordinary bus? Were the manufacturers claiming that the buses would do 100 miles between charges? If in normal use they only do half that then they were lying. There seems to have been a complete lack of due diligence but then it’s only other people’s money isn’t it?
The article implied they were used on short, flat routes; it was not normal use.
No need to prototype if you are looking for Green creds. The amount spent is the key, not what is received for it. The buses not working means nothing.
‘Philadelphia’s Proterra buses were first rolled out for the 2016 DNC convention with a promise that the city was “plugging into an emissions free future.”’
Full value realized in 2016. Yesterday’s campaign banner, going in the bin today.
What’s happening with the electric buses that idiot Khan is buying for London. Anyone know?
Also interesting article on Reuters that because Chinese hold over 90 per cent of rare earth materials for battery car, manufacturers already looking to use lest effective battery materials which lessen vehicle range. And manufacturers only just gearing up for EV manufacture. Not looking good for EV’s to come down in price and have greater range
https://www.iea.org/news/clean-energy-demand-for-critical-minerals-set-to-soar-as-the-world-pursues-net-zero-goals
“The special report, part of the IEA’s flagship World Energy Outlook series, underscores that the mineral requirements of an energy system powered by clean energy technologies differ profoundly from one that runs on fossil fuels. A typical electric car requires six times the mineral inputs of a conventional car, and an onshore wind plant requires nine times more mineral resources than a similarly sized gas-fired power plant.
Demand outlooks and supply vulnerabilities vary widely by mineral, but the energy sector’s overall needs for critical minerals could increase by as much as six times by 2040, depending on how rapidly governments act to reduce emissions.”
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/shortages-flagged-ev-materials-lithium-cobalt-2021-07-01/
“Electric vehicle batteries can use lithium carbonate or lithium hydroxide, but the industry typically talks of lithium carbonate equivalent (LCE) which contains both. BMI’s George Miller forecasts a LCE deficit of 25,000 tonnes this year and expects to see acute deficits from 2022.
“Unless we see significant and imminent investment into large, commercially viable lithium deposits, these shortages will extend out to the end of the decade,” Miller said.”
And then there are the “Battery Farms”….
If that happened over here, the head honcho of the transit department would leave with a huge payoff, pension topped up etc. and be re-employed with another LA on a mega salary.
“And then there are the “Battery Farms”….
……where battery chickens lay…….
You are confusing what look like city buses
with what they really are:
They are mobile homes for homeless people,
and merely resemble city buses.
They are not parked because they can’t move.
They are parked because the homeless people
got motion sickness from their movement.
The electric motors are used to generate heat on cold nights.
Do you have something against homeless people?
This comment is serious. Not satire.