New hybrid fuel cell buses for GVB Amsterdam
Public transport company GVB, operator of urban transport in the city region of Amsterdam, will start with 2 hybrid fuel-cell buses in their daily operations in the Spring of 2011.
The main features of the buses, built by the Dutch company Advanced Public Transport Systems (part of the VDL Group) are:
- Lightweight composite body, with a length of 18 meter (24m and 26m available)
- Powered by a 150 kW fuel cell system (Ballard)
- Electric energy storage in nickel metal hydride batteries and ultra capacitors.
After a successful 4 years trial with fuel cell buses in the European projects CUTE (Clean Urban Transport for Europe) and HyFLEET:CUTE this will be the next step of GVB in exploring ways for public transport to contribute to a better air quality in a dense populated urban environment.
This 2 years demonstration project is part of a Dutch programme for innovations in building and operating public transport buses. Co-funding from the City Region of Amsterdam (Stadsregio Amsterdam) and the municipality of Amsterdam made this project possible. The project will be executed in cooperation with RVK, who is the region public transport company of Cologne in Germany. RVK will operate 2 identical hybrid fuel cell buses.
For more information contact Ir. Frits van Drunen and on HyFLEET:CUTE project see :
http://www.hydrogencarsnow.com/HyFLEETCUTE.htm