AFMNB SAUVéR - SSé Project

The Association francophone des municipalités du Nouveau-Brunswick (AFMNB), in partnership with the town of Dieppe and three other municipalities (towns of Shippigan and St-Quentin and the regional municipality of Tracadie) will conduct a pilot project to determine the feasibility of introducing a regional electric car sharing program. During the pilot project, six electric vehicles (EVs) will be added to the fleets of the participating municipalities (1 or 2 per municipality) and will also be available to the community via the region’s car-sharing platform (SAUVéR: Système d’autopartage de véhicules électriques en région). The project will also include development of an electric charging station (SSé), a HUB that will support dynamic community use of the electric vehicles and contribute to the development of an electric Route verte (green road) in New Brunswick and Canada. The HUB project will involve installation of eight level-2 charging stations, as well as one level-3 fast-charging station, if possible. To increase the possibility of success, the project will also include publicity and communications regarding the car-sharing/electric charging (SAUVéR-SSé) project and concept. The anticipated environmental benefits are: • Greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction with the use of new EVs by municipal employees and sharing these vehicles with the community. Access to electric vehicles will also help optimize user behaviour because it will increase access to passenger cars and reduce the use of trucks and vans. It is estimated that use of the new EVs by municipal employees and the community during the pilot project will reduce GHG emissions by 15,793 kg CO2/year, a drop of 81% compared to the use of conventional vehicles for the same trips. • Annual energy consumption reduction of about 242 GJ/year, or 81%, thanks to the use of EVs instead of conventional vehicles by municipal employees and the community. • A modal shift measured by the number of community vehicles (NCV) indicator. Reducing the number of vehicles generates environmental benefits (environmental cost of producing and disposing of vehicle parts) and socioeconomic benefits because car sharing will reduce communities’ vehicle requirements. The numbers for this indicator will be adjusted to reflect population fluctuations. The pilot project follows a feasibility study (MCIP 15215) conducted by the AFMNB in cooperation with eleven New Brunswick municipalities, including the four communities participating in this pilot project. During the study, municipal vehicle use was exhaustively analyzed for each municipality. The anticipated environmental benefits of this pilot project are based on this data. This project was preceded by two similar initiatives in Quebec: a pilot project (GMF 15054) and a capital project for installation of the SAUVéR platform (MCIP 15591). The pilot project is aligned with existing policies and programs in New Brunswick that promote transportation electrification, including New Brunswick Power’s Drive Electric program. The municipalities and the AFMNB will purchase charging stations under this program. Also, each of the four municipalities involved in the pilot project has achieved 3 of the 5 milestones in FCM’s Partners for Climate Protection (PCP) program and their participation in this pilot project is aligned with the action plans from the PCP program. (Project description from original funding application)