Off-road equipment continues to be a significant contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) and criteria pollutant emissions in California, even as emissions have been reduced by a combination of regulatory strategies and incentive programs. Electrification of off-road equipment will be critical to achieve ambitious goals for operating 100 percent zero-emission off-road vehicles and equipment by 2035 (N-79-20) and achieving carbon neutrality by 2045. However, off-road equipment has a wide variety of applications, engine sizes, and configurations that make it a challenge to characterize their representative operations, energy demands, and duty cycles. A comprehensive study will provide information on both the technological and economical feasibilities of hybridizing or fully electrifying fossil fuel-powered off-road equipment.  The results can inform incentive and regulatory programs that will move the off-road sector toward cleaner and lower-carbon technologies,

UC Riverside analyzed real-world activity data obtained from various types of off-road equipment and characterized their duty cycles and energy consumption. This characterization helped to evaluate how much GHG and criteria pollutant emissions can be reduced by hybridizing or electrifying liquid fuel-powered off-road equipment using current hybridization and electrification technologies.

The research team suggests that agricultural tractors, excavators, graders, rubber-tired loaders, and backhoes, which are among the most populous and high emitting equipment types, can be electrified with currently available electric motor and battery technologies. For these equipment types, replacing fossil fuel-powered equipment smaller than 100 horsepower (HP) with electric equipment is the most cost-effective in terms of dollars per ton of emission reduction.

Please join us for a research seminar to hear an update on UC Riverside’s research that highlights the hybridization and electrification potentials of different off-road equipment, as well as policy considerations in designing incentive programs to accelerate the development, demonstration, and adoption of electric off-road equipment.

Date:                 April 29, 2022

Time:                10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.

Passcode:        906167

Registration Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZEqdu-oqz8sGNAN5wdWDCFj-CsrtzDVIhgd

Register

Speaker Biography

Dr. Kanok Boriboonsomsin is a Research Engineer in the Transportation Systems Research Group and an Associate Director of the College of Engineering – Center for Environmental Research and Technology (CE-CERT) at the University of California, Riverside. His research interests include sustainable transportation, transportation electrification, vehicle energy and emissions modeling, connected and automated vehicles, intelligent transportation systems, and traffic operations. Dr. Boriboonsomsin currently serves as the Vice-Chair of the Measurement and Modeling Subcommittee under the Air Quality and Greenhouse Gas Mitigation Committee of the Transportation Research Board (TRB). He is also a member of TRB, ITE, ITSCA, IEEE, and SAE International.