UAE-made electric buses to hit the road by 2022-end

Under the ‘Made in UAE’ 100 per cent electric bus initiative, Emirates Global Motor Electric, part of Al Fahim Group, Hitachi Energy and Yinlong Energy are conducting trial runs with two zero-emission electric buses.

Head of Emirates Global Motor Electric and Emirates Global Industries, Hany Tawfik, said that electric buses are expected to hit the roads by the end of 2022.

They can cover a distance of 95 kilometres on a single charge. The electric buses will have less than 10-second world’s fastest flash charging facility at bus stops.

The two buses being tested, a Dolphin series 12-meter, 34-seater bus for public transportation and another vintage series 10.5-metre, 30-seater for shuttle service, have been manufactured at Yinlong Energy’s headquarters in China’s Zhuhai.

In 2020, RTA successfully converted 50 per cent of the Dubai taxi fleet into environmentally-friendly hybrid vehicles. It intends to convert the entire taxi fleet to hybrid and electric vehicles by 2027. In December 2019, it launched the trial run of the first hydrogen taxi in the Middle East and deployed it as a limo service at the Dubai International Airport.