The MBTA has been accepting the first few vehicles under that contract over the past few months. A T spokesperson told StreetsblogMASS that 12 of its new battery-electric buses are currently in service, and testing is still underway. <\/p>\n
\t\t\tRecommended<\/p>\n
\t\t The MTA, by contrast, took delivery of its first 60 New Flyer battery-electric buses back in 2024\u00a0\u2013 the first step in its plans to phase out fossil-fueled buses entirely by 2040. <\/p>\n But, as Dave Colon recently reported for StreetsblogNYC<\/a>, the MTA\u2019s new electric buses have been struggling with reliability problems. As a result, the agency has put plans to buy hundreds of additional electric buses on hold. <\/p>\n \u201cThose zero-emission buses are not where they need to be in terms of delivering reliable bus service,\u201d warned Jessie Lazarus, the MTA\u2019s head of rolling stock procurement, at a June MTA board meeting<\/a>. <\/p>\n Lazarus presented data that indicates that the MTA\u2019s battery-powered New Flyer buses have been breaking down more than three times as frequently as their diesel-powered counterparts. <\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re also in service about 30 or 40 percent less than our diesel buses,\u201d said Lazarus.<\/p>\n Still, Lazarus told board members that the agency is still committed to helping bus manufacturers refine the new technology. She noted that the MTA is also building out new bus-charging infrastructure at 7 of its bus garages this year. <\/p>\n And she said that the MTA is working with manufacturers to work out the kinks of the new technology. <\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re running pilot performance periods to make sure we can test their technology in real time, and give that iterative feedback to allow for incremental improvements on these buses when they\u2019re in our operating environment,\u201d said Lazarus. <\/p>\n A second-mover advantage?<\/p>\n MBTA officials told StreetsblogMASS that, so far, they haven\u2019t been experiencing the same problems with their own New Flyer buses.<\/p>\n Although there are considerably fewer buses in operation at the T, and they\u2019ve only been operating for a few months now, the T reports that its new battery-electric buses have so far averaged 28,653 miles between failures. <\/p>\n That\u2019s roughly in line with the performance of older diesel and methane-powered buses: the T reported earlier this year<\/a> that its entire bus fleet averaged 30,574 miles between failures in the three-year period from 2022 to 2024.<\/p>\n \u201cWe continue evaluating bus metrics daily, and are working with New Flyer on software improvements, along with vendor evaluation of unexpected early failures,\u201d an MBTA spokesperson told StreetsblogMASS. \u201cWe have just started to accumulate true in-service mileage with a larger number of buses over the last few months, (and) we are seeing improvements as we accumulate mileage.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNow that we are past the initial insertion into service, their performance will be closely evaluated with New Flyer and their sub-vendors to validate our performance requirements,\u201d they added. <\/p>\n
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Jessie Lazarus (right) discusses battery-electric bus performance issues at a June MTA board meeting. <\/p>\n
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