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Add to Preferred SourcesThe European Investment Bank (EIB) is financing the modernisation of Barcelona’s fleet of city buses by granting a EUR 73.5m loan helping Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona (TMB) put 254 new, safer, less polluting and more modern vehicles into service.
The EIB financing will contribute to the replacement of diesel and the first generation compressed natural gas vehicles with new, cleaner alternatives. In concrete terms, the city will have 116 new electric buses, 63 hybrids and 75 using latest generation compressed natural gas. The renewal will also cover Barcelona’s 20 diesel-powered double-decker tourist buses, which will be replaced with hybrids.
The new vehicles will be introduced in late-2019 (first 105), in 2020 (another 75) and in 2021 (74). This will enable TMB to accelerate the transition to a zero-emission bus network and to improve service quality and reliability. In addition to improving air quality, the goal is to increase the demand for this service to cut private transport use. Barcelona’s public city buses have seen a 17% increase in use over the last six years – transporting 203 million people in 2018 – a figure that is still growing.
This agreement is the fourth implemented by the EIB in Spain under its Cleaner Transport Facility programme for financing cleaner transport systems in Europe. Under this initiative, the EIB has provided financing to renew the city bus fleets of Las Palmas, Palma de Mallorca and Valencia.
Original source: EIB
Published on 28 May 2019