Strategic scenario-based modeling for electric bus charging station deployment in Addis Ababa

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

The adoption of electric buses is a key step toward sustainable urban mobility. In rapidly growing cities such as Addis Ababa, fleet electrification must be supported by strategically planned charging infrastructure capable of accommodating operational patterns, grid constraints, and renewable integration while minimizing system costs. However, charging infrastructure planning in Addis Ababa remains underdeveloped, creating a gap between electrification targets and efficient deployment pathways. This study develops a planning framework that integrates detailed bus energy demand estimation with scenario-based charging analysis using publicly available GTFS data. Per-bus energy consumption is simulated with EV-Fleet-Sim based on vehicle dynamics and operational schedules. Then, the estimated demand is embedded in a spatially explicit charging model (GTFS4EV) to evaluate depot, layover, on-route, and mixed charging strategies under projected 2030 fleet expansion. The framework enables comparative assessment of spatio-temporal charging demand, charger requirements, battery capacity implications, infrastructure costs, and photovoltaic integration potential. Results indicate that each bus consumes an average of 1.86 kWh/km, with a daily energy demand of 401 kWh. Charging strategy selection strongly influences demand patterns and techno-economic performance. Depot-only charging leads to high centralized peak loads and large battery requirements (401 kWh on average), whereas distributed strategies reduce peak demand and battery sizing (139–327 kWh). A mixed configuration (50% depot, 30% layover, 20% on-route) minimizes peak load while simultaneously enabling low infrastructure costs and good solar PV integration, reaching a potential of 40% annual energy self-sufficiency. The findings provide a practical and transferable planning framework for African cities pursuing electric bus deployment.