Continuing down its path toward becoming California’s first all-electric bus fleet, the Anaheim Transportation Network (ATN) has selected AMPLY Power to manage all aspects of charging for its 46 electric buses serving Anaheim and surrounding communities.
The production scale, 20-year contract is the first of its kind and largest fleet charge management services (CMS) agreement to date, which covers the management of ATN’s charging operations from system design, installation, equipment purchase, operations and maintenance for a fixed price per kWh consumed.
The model, based on the power purchase agreement that popularized solar energy, ensures mission-critical vehicles are charged and ready for use every day. This agreement includes the construction of a 545 kW solar canopy providing 25% of the total expected energy consumption. ATN estimates $4.8M of fuel savings over 20 years compared to liquid natural gas (LNG) or compressed natural gas (CNG).
“This project marks a significant step for our community by working towards our 100% electric bus fleet,” said Diana Kotler, executive director at ATN. “Collaborating with AMPLY Power helps ensure our electric transit operations run smoothly, efficiently and cost-effectively. We look forward to the success of this project and growing our electrification program exponentially.”
With the agreement, AMPLY manages the charging system, networking operations and new infrastructure of chargers and solar panels. AMPLY’s charge automation software can flatten the peak electrical demands below 2 MW and reduce utility service upgrade requirements for ATN, as well as minimize any electric grid impact for Anaheim Public Utilities. Peak load at the site would traditionally be nearly 5 MW without charge management. Optimizing the charging for ATN allows buses to achieve 99.99% operational availability at the lowest peak energy demand by reducing time-of-use (TOU) energy and demand costs.
The Phase One ATN Claudina Site project will be outfitted with 46 electric bus charging stations and a solar canopy covering the entire bus charging area. AMPLY selected REC Solar for installing the solar panels. Subsequent phases will include a second new facility handling maintenance and bus-washing, as well as growing the fleet to include more electric buses and chargers. Both brand-new sites will operate 100% electric buses on their first day in service.
Through a service offering with fixed price metered by utilization, fleet customers like ATN can draw a direct economic comparison to dispensing fossil fuel without upfront capital costs and operational uncertainty. The greater Anaheim, Los Angeles and Long Beach metropolitan areas rank the highest of 25 cities studied in the amount of potential savings city bus fleets could gain from electrification programs – with or without managed charging. In its most recent whitepaper, AMPLY estimated more than 50% fuel savings on electricity compared to diesel.
The new contract with Anaheim is the latest in a series of partnerships AMPLY has signed with California transit agencies, including Tri Delta Transit and SolTrans. These agencies and other fleets see AMPLY as a key partner to decarbonize fleet operations through simple, reliable and cost-effective electric refueling, notes the company.
Photo: The ATN selected AMPLY Power to manage all aspects of charging for its 46 electric buses servicing Anaheim