The Study on the Cost Structures and Market Potential of Fuel Cell Bus

• Main Authors: Yi-Cheng Hsiao, 蕭易呈
• Other Authors: Chaung-Ing Hsu
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2005
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/71803086964068860473

碩士 === 國立交通大學 === 運輸科技與管理學系 === 93 === At present, human face two crucial problems of fossil fuel energy depletion and environmental pollution. Thus, developing high-efficiency environment-friendly vehicles to replace traditional oil-fueled vehicles has become an important issue. The driving performances of fuel cell vehicles have been developed to approach oil-fueled vehicles. Those vehicles have the characteristics of zero pollution emission, yet their costs still remain relatively high. The size and pollution emission of buses are larger than other vehicles, so the fuel cell bus should be the more environment-friendly and potential-developed vehicle. This study explores the interaction between supply and demand of fuel-cell buses, and formulates supply cost functions and demand model using analytical approach. The cost function is divided into two parts, including fuel cell bus costs and hydrogen refueling station cost. Fuel cell bus cost includes depreciation cost, maintenance cost and hydrogen cost; while hydrogen refueling station cost includes average establishment cost, average operation cost and equipment repair cost. Variables affecting fuel cell bus demand function are bus purchase cost, fuel cost per unit mileage, the maximum speed and pollution emission per unit mileage. In addition, this study applies gray theory to predict the trend of oil price and hydrogen price, and analyzes the influence due to the change in fuel-price differences on bus operators’ cost. Moreover, a mathematical programming model is formulated to determine the equilibrium demand volumes and the optimal capital subsidy and air-pollution performance subsidy by minimizing the total social cost subject to government subsidy budget. The results of the case study show that the government subsidy can increase the fuel-cell bus usage of bus operators, and at year 2021, fuel cell buses will have the competitive advantage over oil-fueled vehicles. In addition, the more fuel-cell buses bus operators adopt, the more air pollution will be decreased, and the more energy will be saved. Regarding performance subsidy, the amount and frequency of subsidy is decreasing year by year, thereby performance subsidy policy can be discontinued at year 2021, at which the total costs of fuel cell buses are less than the total costs of oil-fueled ones. Finally, through implementing the government’s subsidy policy, the benefits of pollution and energy saving are shown to be manifested with the increased years.