EU-funded hydrogen buses to be introduced in nine European cities
The European Commission has awarded 18.5 million euro to nine European cities for the introduction of hydrogen and fuel cell buses, part of the CUTE project, funded by the Fifth Framework programme's Energy, environment and sustainable development programme. In a recent white paper on transport policy, the Commission made a commitment to reduce congestion and its detrimental effects, in particular in urban areas. The nine cities participating in the project are Amsterdam, Barcelona, Hamburg, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Porto, Stockholm and Stuttgart, which will use the buses from 2003. This project will be the first volume production test of this scale for fuel cell buses conducted anywhere in the world. The buses will be produced by EvoBus GmbH in Germany, and the bus operators in each participating city will build a filling station for gaseous hydrogen. Fuel producers are also participating in the creation of the hydrogen infrastructure and some of these will subsequently operate the filling stations so as to gain experience with alternative fuels themselves. Hydrogen will be produced through different methods in order to provide data for an efficiency comparison. The performance of the buses will be comparable to that of conventional diesel buses, and they will accommodate up to 70 passengers.