E-power suggested for Cebu’s Bus Rapid Transit

When the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT)  is implemented in Cebu, energy officials hope buses can run on electric power instead of just fossil fuel.

Energy Secretary Rene Almendras on Tuesday said the BRT plan was presented last Monday by the Department of Transportation and Communication (DOTC) to the economic cluster meeting of the Cabinet.

“In Cebu, we are about to launch your BRT,” he said in  an  Energy Forum in Cebu City.

“I strongly  recommended that you study alternative fuel for the buses already.”

He suggested operating the  buses on a  hybrid system instead of pure diesel.

“They’re electric buses. The tires are run by electric motors but there’s a small two-liter engine that is running just to run the air-conditioning and recharge the batteries,” he said.

“It works. We will see a direct hybrid bus by the end of November. Victory Liner (in Manila) is bringing one in,” he added.

Electric buses are more environment friendly.

“The engine is not loaded, you don’t pollute… It’s running on standard RPN. Emission is very good. Efficiency is very good,” he said.

He said he would have wanted natural gas as alternative fuel but it is not yet available in  Cebu so he pushed for a hybrid instead.

With the BRT, a plan pushed by Rep. Tomas Osmeña during his term as Cebu City mayor,  buses will have fixed stations on elevated platforms where passengers will be loaded and unloaded.

Under the scheme, buses will eventually  replace jeepneys in the city’s major roads. A total of 190 buses will move more than 300,000 passengers daily once the BRT system is fully functional.

The BRT will run  from barangay Bulacao in the south to  Talamban in the north, passing through the Cebu Business Park.

A pre-feasibility study was made by a World Bank consultant, Integrated Transport Planning of England.

The mass transport system is part of a 50-kilometer BRT in Metro Manila and Cebu, with a proposed budget of $350 million.

Part of the amount will come from the Clean Technology Fund (CTF), which is administered by a steering committee and jointly handled by the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and other multilateral development banks./Correspondent Carmel Loise Matus