Commencement of a Study of an Energy Management System for Full-scale Deployment of EV Buses for Fixed Route Bus Services
Michinori Holdings, Inc.
Aizu Bus Co., Ltd.
DENSO CORPORATION
ABB Bailey Japan Ltd.
DAIHEN Corporation
Deloitte Tohmatsu Financial Advisory LLC
Japan (Nov. 10, 2020) – Michinori Holdings, Inc. (Michinori HD), Aizu Bus Co., Ltd. (Aizu Bus), DENSO Corporation (DENSO), ABB Bailey Japan Ltd. (ABB Bailey), DAIHEN Corporation (DAIHEN), and Deloitte Tohmatsu Financial Advisory LLC (Deloitte Tohmatsu) were awarded a contract for the R&D and Demonstration Project Toward Realization of Logistics MaaS (Mobility as a Service) Using Commercial Vehicles financed by the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology in FY2020. The demonstration project started in October 2020. In this project, Aizu Bus gathers data from three EV buses, which were manufactured by BYD and have been operated since December 2018. DENSO will analyze electric mileage and verifies the predictive algorithms using AI technology, and DAIHEN validate the charging management technology for an efficient charge of the EV buses using quick chargers equipped with Synergy Link. The possibility of deploying EV buses will also be studied for each operation office belonging to group companies of Michinori HD.
Outline of the demonstration test
1. Gathering data from the EV buses and verifying electric mileage
Data are gathered from the EV buses operated by Aizu Bus. It includes vehicle data, such as power consumption and route distances traveled by the EV buses; number of passengers as measured by in-vehicle cameras; operation delay information transmitted from the bus location system; and external environment data, such as weather and snowfall. DENSO will analyze the gathered data using AI technology and verify the predictive algorithms that takes into account changes due to the number of users and the weather per time zone. The results of the demonstration will be used as basic data for deploying EV buses in the future.
2. Demonstration of the charging management technology
In this demonstration, ABB Bailey Japan will create charging schedules optimized based on data such as the operation plan, electricity price and system capacity, using OPTIMAX®, which is the ABB Ability™ Energy Management Suite solution. The EV buses will be charged based on the schedules at Juso Business office of DAIHEN by the Synergy Link*1 technology developed by DAIHEN. The purpose is to establish a technology to charge buses at an appropriate timing, control the charging amount, and manage operations in case of large-scale deployment of EV buses.
*1) Synergy Link is a new autonomous distributed control technology for optimizing energy usage by linking devices and systems through coordination (synergy) without requiring a high-performance management controller.
3. Study of the possibility of deploying EV buses for each operation office
The possibility of full-scale deployment of EV buses will be studied for the operation offices belonging to the group companies of Michinori HD by using the knowledge gained from the demonstration.
Future development
An energy management system for EV buses will be built to monitor the energy consumption, coordinate the electricity purchase and formulate operation plans in an integrated manner. The purpose is to rationalize initial and operational cost of the EV buses.
By optimizing the operation of EV buses, the feasibility of reduction of the on-board battery capacity and power interchange from on-board batteries will be studied. EV buses will be deployed by taking advantages of the know-how from this study, to contribute to a more sustainable society.
About Michinori Holdings, Inc.
Head office: Gran Tokyo South Tower 8F, 1-9-2 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, 100-6608, Japan
Established: March, 2009
Representative: Jun Matsumoto, Group CEO
Main business: Bus (collective, express, chartered), railway, tourism (travel agency, hotel), vehicle maintenance, real estate
Website: http://www.michinori.co.jp/ (Japanese)
About Aizu Bus Co., Ltd.
Head office: 195 Byakko-machi, Aizuwakamatsu City, Fukushima, 965-0024, Japan
Established: July, 1943
Representative: Toshiki Sato, President
Main business: Bus (collective, express, chartered), taxi, tourism, temporary staffing service
Number of vehicles: 196 buses, 99 taxies
Website: https://www.aizubus.com/ (Japanese)
About DENSO CORPORATION
Head office: 1-1, Showa-cho, Kariya City, Aichi, 448-8661, Japan
Established: December, 1949
Representative: Koji Arima, President & CEO
Main business: Development, manufacturing, and sales of automotive parts, systems, and lifestyle and industrial-related equipment
Website: https://www.denso.com/global/en/
About ABB Bailey Japan Limited
Head office: 511 Baraki, Izunokuni City, Shizuoka, 410-2193, Japan
Established: March, 1971
Representative: Joerg Josef Theis, President & CEO
Main business：Thermal power; LNG storage plants; biomass power; fuel cells; waste processing plants; automatic control systems for plants; data processing systems; automation solutions and measuring devices; development, design, manufacturing, sales, erection, adjustment and construction of control equipment
Website: http://www.bailey.co.jp/ (Japanese)
About DAIHEN Corporation
Head office: 2-1-11 Tagawa, Yodogawa-ku, Osaka City, Osaka, 532-8512, Japan
Established: December, 1919
Representative: Tetsuya Tajiri, President
Main business: Manufacturing of transformers, welding machines, industrial robots, RF/MW generators for semiconductor equipment and energy management systems
Website: https://www.daihen.co.jp/en/
About Deloitte Tohmatsu Financial Advisory LLC
Head office: Marunouchi Nijubashi Building, 3-2-3 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, 100-8363, Japan
Representative: Kazuhiro Fukushima, Financial Advisory, CEO
Established: June, 2001
Professionals: 1,052 (As of the end of May, 2020)
Main business: M&A Advisory, Corporate Revitalization, Fraud/Dispute Support, Intellectual property Advisory, Government & Public Services, Sports Business
Website: https://www2.deloitte.com/jp/en/pages/about-deloitte/articles/dtfa/deloitte-tohmatsu-financial-advisory.html
