Durham County Council has placed the first order for Optare's Solo EV battery-powered bus. It will put three into service with local operator John Bell Travel on the Durham World Heritage Centre service. The buses are part funded through the Government's £30m Green Bus Fund, which meets the extra cost over that of an equivalent diesel-powered bus. Optare is the UK's first firm to make a practical full-size battery powered bus. It expects to make all 55 electric vehicles that the scheme will fund. With these and a number of Optare hybrids it expects to sell, the company will build vehicles worth more than £12m of Green Bus Fund grant money.
|
