Transition of Electric Mobility in Colombia: Technical and Economic Evaluation of Scenarios for the Integration of E-taxis in Bucaramanga

Globally, the transport sector has been directed towards electric mobility by policies, regulations, development strategies and economic incentives. The transport sector has an important strategic role in the economic development of a country, the sustainability of this sector has an impact on political and scientific discussions due to its environmental impact. In Colombia, the global targets for reducing polluting emissions begin to drive the renewal of the automotive park towards electric mobility, therefore, this research was carried out with the aim of carrying out a technical and economic analysis of scenarios for the e-taxis in Bucaramanga, the incentives applied in the two projects developed in the two most important cities of Colombia were taken as the basis to compare possible implementation scenarios in the short and medium term. Three technologies (gasoline, gas and electric) were evaluated that were tested using the TAC/km indicator, the financial viability was assessed based on two financial kindness criteria (NPV and IRR). The results obtained allow to conclude two strategies that make it possible to incorporate the e-taxis in Bucaramanga, (1) exemption from payment of taxi registration, in case of incorporation of a new vehicle; (2) economic incentive of more than 20% at the time of purchase of the EV, accompanied by a 25% increase in the cost of the minimum service fee, in the case of the replacement of a taxi.


INTRODUCTION
The transport sector has an important strategic role in the economic development of a country, the sustainability of this sector has an impact on political and scientific discussions. The negative environmental impact of the massive flow of goods and people, the use of fossil fuels and the fleet of vehicles in old age, deteriorate air quality, being the main motivation for political and scientific debates (Carteni et al., 2020). Diversification in the energy matrix that supplies the transport sector is relevant to introduce itself to electric mobility, even if it presents new risks, technological challenges, and commercial trends (Nieuwenhuis et al., 2020).
The world estimates 1 billion vehicles and only 1% of these are electric vehicles, yet world leaders in the car market such as China, Europe and the USA are developing and implementing subsidies and public policies to enable the procurement of electric vehicles more easily (Henderson, 2020;IEA, 2018), in turn, there is a great deal of public intervention in new commercial trends in supply chains, renewable and non-renewable energy supplies, and the adaptation of urban spaces for the recharging of electric vehicles (Henderson, 2020;Keith et al., 2019;Kuby, 2019).
For Colombia, global emission reduction targets are beginning to drive the renovation of the automotive park to electric mobility in This Journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License some of its major cities, focusing on the public transport sector. This research presents a technical and economic analysis of scenarios for the integration of electric taxis in Bucaramanga, one of the five most important cities in Colombia.

AN APPROACH TO GLOBAL ELECTRIC MOBILITY
Globally, the transport sector has been directed towards electric mobility using policies, regulations, development strategies and economic incentives. Table 1 presents a list of relevant incentives, policies, regulations, and strategies in countries that have already begun the transition to electric mobility with the vision of promoting the use of electric vehicles and reducing polluting emissions.

ELECTRIC MOBILITY IN COLOMBIA
Colombia detected that its automotive park has potential for improvement to contribute to the 20% reduction in polluting emissions by 2030, according to the United Nations Conference on Climate Change (La República, 2018), because the average age of vehicles in Colombia is approximately 16 years according China (Yang et al., 2018) Beijing The policy is specifically designed to subsidize the adoption of BEV in the taxi fleet and shorten the life of Combustion Gas Vehicle (CGV) taxis from 8 to 6 years. If a CGV taxi is withdrawn within 7 years, you can receive a minimum subsidy of ¥10,000 per vehicle and tax exemption on the purchase in addition to government subsidies China (Li et al., 2016)   -Economic incentives between $7,500 -10,000 USD at points of sale to the Colombian Association of Motor Vehicles (ANDEMOS) (Dinero, 2016), the Colombian government has made efforts to promote the renovation of the motor park through pilot projects in cities of the country with a focus on Taxi Fleet Companies (TFC), independent taxi drivers and the mass transit sector (electric buses) (Sclar et al., 2020). The main projects that Colombia has developed to promote the transition of the transport sector to electric mobility are the Project of Bogotá and Project of Medellin.

Project of Bogota
The Project of Bogota consisted of the pilot operation of 50 e-taxis within the city without the mobility restrictions and the exemption from registration 1 applied to conventional taxis, with a temporality of 3 years from the validity of the 677 of 2011 (de Bogotá, 2011), then the current term was extended 2 years by District Decree 407 of 2012 (de Bogotá, 2012), for a total of 5 years, which was subsequently extended again for 5 years more, for a total of 10 years, by District Decree 376 of 2013 (de Bogotá, 2013).

Project of Medellin
The project of electric taxis in Medellin was presented on May 3, 2019 by the mayor of Medellin and the company "EMPRESAS PÚBLICAS DE MEDELLÍN (EPM)," in order to introduce 1500 electric taxis in its first 3 years through the replacement of taxis that use conventional fuels such as gasoline. EPM provided an economic incentive of $5,584.13 USD to offset an electric vehicle's increased initial investment than internal combustion engine vehicles (ICE). In addition, Resolution 2019500009417 issued by the Medellin Mobility Secretary determined that the minimum fare for individual motor land-based public transportation for passengers in electric vehicles is worth $2.07 USD different from the $1.67 fare that conventional taxis have (Alcaldía de Medellín, 2019). The incentives have generated a great reception by conventional taxi owners to migrate to the electric vehicle, and by users who positively value their comfort.

TECHNICAL AND ECONOMIC EVALUATION FOR THE INTEGRATION OF E-TAXIS IN BUCARAMANGA
To technically evaluate the integration of electric vehicles in the transport sector of Bucaramanga, it was decided to apply a TFC that had a long history in this sector, this TFC has 31 taxis that use two types of fuel: gas and gas, where its most representative vehicle model is the Hyundai i10.
The limited time of use to test the ten TFC vehicle sample gave way to a characteristic route. The development of the characteristic route was made from a heat map with the most frequent routes or routes used by taxi 2 drivers. The mobile application "My track" was the tool used for the acquisition of data measured in real time during each day of the taxi travel, the data obtained were processed using the Map Source and Microsoft Excel software (3D Map add-on), where the first software extracted the coordinates 1 Pay-per-seater for operate as a taxi public service vehicle. 2 The average distance traveled in a day by a taxi driver is 200 km/day. of the routes made by the taxi sample and through the Microsoft Excel 3D Map add-in the information was examined to obtain the route overlay and thus the heat map that subsequently allowed the obtaining of the characteristic route.
Three vehicles with different technologies were used ( Table 2) to simultaneously route the characteristic route, making appropriate measurements to determine actual energy consumption and associated costs.
The selected vehicles were evaluated in six scenarios as shown in Table 3, global considerations were assumed for all scenarios and some particular considerations varying by scenario (Table 4).
The financial kindness procedures chosen to evaluate the scenarios were Net Present Value (NPV) and Internal Rate of Return (IRR).   Below are the equations used to economically evaluate the scenarios raised previously, thus obtaining the maintenance costs (Table 5), costs per operation (Table 6) and the initial investment for the purchase of a taxi according to the type of energy (Table 7):  Where, TAC/km: Total annual cost per kilometer traveled over the life of the vehicle (USD/km).

RESULTS
The heat map (Figure 1) shows the overlap of the routes made by the monitored vehicles, determining the characteristic route ( Figure 2) that was traveled to establish the comparison of the consumption of the vehicles for each type of technology, Table 8 exposes the results obtained. Table 9 shows the annual fuel costs calculated for the three types of vehicles (gasoline, gas and electric) from the characteristic route and the consumption required to travel. Table 10 summarizes the results obtained by evaluating the 6 scenarios presented as global, particular, and financial kindness criteria (NPV and IRR).
In the financial comparison of scenario 1 (Figure 3) it was observed that for a natural person, the most viable option based on the NPV (gasoline $9,706,750 USD; gas $17,827.31 USD; electric $7,660,860 USD) is to buy a taxi that uses gas as energy; however, if an incentive such as the Project of Bogota is applied, purchasing    The additional cost of the gas vehicle is due to the cost per conversion to this fuel.   an electric taxi is the best option considering the NPV (gasoline $9,706,750 USD; gas $17,827.31 USD; electric $35,123.83 USD). Figure 4 presents the financial comparison of scenario 2 that the most viable option for the TFC is to buy a taxi that uses gasoline as energy according to the NPV (gasoline $19,174.29 USD; gas $18,231.41 USD; electric $ 11,278.74 USD), although if policies are integrated as in the project of Medellín, buying an electric taxi is the best alternative depending on the NPV (gasoline $19,174.29 USD;gas $18,231.41 USD;electric $21,958.78 USD).
The financial comparison of scenario 3 ( Figure 5)  In the financial comparison of scenario 4 ( Figure 6) it was observed that for a natural person, the most viable option is to buy a taxi that use electricity as energetic according to the NPV (gasoline $18,536.42 USD;gas $18,788.64 USD;electric $25,611.36 USD). Figure 7 presents the financial comparison of scenario 5 it was determined that for the TFC, the most viable option is to buy a taxi that uses electricity as energy according to the NPV (gasoline $12,233.71 USD;gas $11,049.82 USD;electric $27,426.84 USD).
The financial comparison of scenario 6 ( Figure 8) presents the replacement of a taxi driver's vehicle, in which it was detailed that the most viable option according to the NPV (gasoline $54,271.30 USD; gas $54,517.66 USD; electric $58,988.94 USD) is to renew your vehicle for one that uses electricity as energy.
As a result, the TAC/km is presented, which is set out in Figure 9, demonstrating that electric vehicles have a positive gap that tends to increase relative to ICE vehicles over the years.

CONCLUSIONS
Globally, the path to electric mobility has been laid out through policies, regulations, development strategies and economic incentives. China being a benchmark in the evolution of its motor park, driven by government plans with an emphasis on charging infrastructure, monetary stimulus, and R and D, migrating to a value chain generated from new business trends around electric vehicles.
For its part, Colombia belatedly entered the transition to electric mobility, starting in its two main cities, the Project of Bogotá with an unambitious goal did not have an exceptional start, making it necessary to extend the deadlines of special benefits; the project of Medellin supported by the public company EPM was more popular, associated with the increase in income received by taxi drivers, and the sustainable culture of its citizens.
The analysis of the TAC/km indicator for the city of Bucaramanga showed for electric vehicles a positive gap with respect to ICE vehicles, which tends to increase over the years, consistent with the results obtained in medium-term scenario analyses, where electric vehicles will be the most attractive product for taxi drivers and TFC's. In this context, it is currently feasible to incorporate e-taxis, if any of these strategies are applied: (1) exemption from payment of taxi registration, in case of incorporation of a new vehicle, (2) economic incentive of more than 20% at the time of purchase of the EV, accompanied by a 25% increase in the cost of the minimum service fee, in the case of the replacement of a taxi.
To increase the acceleration of the transformation of the Colombian motor park and the integration of the community into commercial trends surrounding electric vehicles, the Colombian government should carry out government programs that promote the capture of markets and electric vehicle technologies so that this niche market is globalized in Colombia.
Future studies of electric mobility could cover topics on the charging infrastructure in Colombia.