The tender process for selecting a supplier for the “Delivery of 5 new electric buses and 5 charging stations for them” has now concluded. The tender commenced with a decision No. F407366/09.08.2023 of Gabrovo Municipality, submitted under the pilot scheme for the Support of Sustainable Urban Mobility from the Recovery and Sustainability Plan of the Republic of Bulgaria.

Our company Chariot Motors was chosen as the supplier, among five other competitors, which participated in the tender process for the delivery of five new 7+/-1 meter long electric buses. The tender award also includes the supply and installation of five charging stations for these buses, warranty service and maintenance, as well as training of the contracting authority staff – the Municipality of Gabrovo.

The tender procedure has been announced under the condition that the contract will be implemented with a secured funding under the National Environmental Protection Agency – Procedure BG-RRP-8.013 “Eco-sustainable Mobility”, after a signed agreement with the state.

You can check out more about the company’s battery products here.

The National Conference of the Bulgarian Association for Parking and Sustainable Urban Mobility (BAPUGM) was held on March 12th and 13th in the city of Kardzhali. The forum was opened by the Kardzhali municipality mayor – Erol Mumun, with a special guest speaker Mr. Tom Antonissen, executive director of the European Parking Association.

Main topics addressed at the conference included:

• The challenges municipalities face in the field of parking and urban mobility;
• The implementation of sustainable and innovative policies and solutions;
• The financing opportunities for the municipalities;
• Parking, urban electromobility and solutions.

The Deputy Minister of Regional Development and Public Works, Mrs. Angelina Boneva, was a panelist at the event. She reviewed the subject related to the European and national financing of municipalities in the parking, transport and electromobility sectors.

The company Chariot Motors was present as a conference sponsor. It presented its projects in Europe and Israel in front of event’s guests representing over 60 Bulgarian municipalities. The company also showcased its ultracapacitor and battery powered electric buses product range, and their advantages for achieving sustainable and ecological urban and intercity transport.

Mr. Ivan Shterev from Chariot Motors was a panelist on the second day of the event. In his presentation he compared the two technologies – ultracapacitor and battery – used to drive Chariot’s electric buses. He reviewed their key characteristics and advantages, the company’s projects, and the financial instruments for their acquisition by Bulgarian municipalities.

📸 Photos from the event can be seen on the Facebook and Linked In pages of the company.

🎥 You can watch the Ivan’s presentation on our YouTube channel here Part 1 and Part 2.

EV WEEK is a forum and a platform for the gathering of leading experts in the field of electromobility, as well as representatives of institutions from Bosnia and Herzegovina, the region, and the EU.

This event is organized in two parts – a conference, consisting of 10 expert panels and presentations, and an exhibition fair where the latest models of electric vehicles, chargers, applications, components, and other parts for electric vehicles are presented. Among the panelists were representatives of business and the academic community. Sarajevo is looking for a complete solution for public transport – trams, trolleys, electric buses, electric scooters, and electric bicycles.

Chariot Motors Company was part of the forum and presented its 18m ultracapacitor (UC) electric bus there. The EV vehicle is one of the most energy-efficient city e-buses on the market. It recharges automatically in 10 to 15 minutes by butting a pantograph onto a terminus charger. The innovative vehicle has an ultracapacitor rated at 108kWh and it draws about 1.3 kWh per kilometre when the vehicle’s total load is 4.5 tonnes in optimal conditions.

In Sarajevo there are two transport operators – public and private. Chariot Motors has piloted 18m ultracapacitor electric bus for real-world testing in the city together with the public transport company Gras. The UC e-bus has already been tested in some European capitals, such as Sofia, Belgrade, Ljubljana, and Zagreb. The feedback of public transport operators and passengers was very positive and satisfied.

You can find additional information about the forum here: https://ev-week.ba/

The European electric bus market recorded a 53% growth in registrations during 2023. 6,354 electric busеs were registered in the EU, including Norway, Iceland, and Switzerland. 43% of the city buses were battery, hydrogen, or ultracapacitor-powered e-buses.

Overall, 13,466 buses with alternative drivelines were registered, marking a 41% increase as compared with the previous year, according to figures by Chatrou CME Solutions.

Development of the electric bus market in 2023

The UK leads in electric bus deployment, with 1 206 units registered in 2023, followed by Germany, Norway, and Spain, with up to 260% of the 136 units registered in 2022. The fastest-growing country in terms of increase in electric bus use is Portugal, where 364 e-buses were registered versus 52 in 2022. Also, Belgium registered a large growth in use, from 42 to 172%.

Hybrid bus registrations saw a significant increase: “The absolute volume of Hybrid buses doubled from 2.018 in 2022 to 4.022 in 2023 with a growth of 99,3%. This is caused by an increase of about 1000 buses, both in the city and the intercity bus segment”, Chatrou CME Solutions notes. Such growth is largely due to the deployment of mild hybrid vehicles.

Gas-powered buses faced a decline in the urban segment. The consultancy highlighted the fact that the “Absolute volume of CNG/LNG buses dropped slightly from 3.274 in 2022 to 2.883 in 2023 – 11,9% decrease. CNG share in the interurban segment is still growing from 978 in 2022 to 1.187 in 2023″.

Source: Sustainable-bus.

Chariot Motors e-buses are part of the newly registered buses in the EU including battery and ultracapacitor vehicles. You can find more about our products here.

By the end of 2025, 34% of the buses purchased for the Bulgarian public transport must be sustainable. This is envisaged in the Council of Ministers’ draft decree, as proposed by the Minister of Transport. The decree sets out the requirements for vehicles when procured by the public sector operators.

A vehicle’s sustainability is determined based on its emissions. These are defined in a special table attached to the Council of Ministers’ regulation. For buses, it means running on an alternative fuel to diesel – for example methane, as well as using electric or hydrogen powered vehicles, as clarified by the Ministry of Transport.

When a municipality announces a tender for regular bus lines, among the criteria for carriers there will be a mandatory requirement for sustainable vehicles percentage. For example, if a company wants to operate 100 buses on a busy route, then 18 of them must meet the sustainability requirements.

In the table, for the first period until December 31, 2025, in addition to the requirement for 34% sustainable buses, there is also another, requiring 17% of them to be zero-emission vehicles – electric or hydrogen powered, which makes up to 3 vehicles. The Ministry of Transport experts believe that this will be valid mostly for the metropolitan municipality. From January 1, 2026, municipal orders for bus lines must require 48 percent of the carrier’s fleet to consist of sustainable vehicles.

Chariot Motors offers electric buses with fast charging ultracapacitor technology, as well as slow charging battery electric buses. Our buses run on the streets of the capital and the city of Gabrovo, being part of Bulgaria’s transition to a sustainable and clean urban transport and environment.

Chariot Motors’ partner Higer Bus Company, the bus leader in bus and coach manufacturing, launched this October at Busworld the electric battery-powered, nine-meter-long bus Azure as a mid-sized product specifically developed for the European market.

The e-bus Azure 9 is equipped with a new CATL battery, high efficiency motor, and intelligent electronic control system. The nine-meter e-vehicle is supplied with ACTIA independent equipment which offers an ergonomic working environment for the driver. The passenger compartment offers a large space, and comfortable 6 m2 standing area. The front independent suspension system allows for less than seven meters bus turning radius. Adopting the ECAS system with adjustable & kneeling function improves the vehicle’s capability in different road conditions and guarantees a superior travelling experience.

The e-bus Azure 9 is fit with a new generation intelligent bus equipment, utilizing CAN bus system for the whole vehicle. With the inclusion of a CAN gateway, the communication quality has been significantly improved. Additionally, the vehicle incorporates T-BOX, an advanced bus information detection and sharing system with back-end data transmission, enabling real-time monitoring of the bus current condition via an online platform.

The length of the electric vehicle Azure 9 could range between 8.7m and 9m. It can be utilised as an urban city bus, and it is suitable for suburban transportation, as well as point-to-point connection operation. The electric bus provides different options for the number of passenger seats, which could expand its operation scenarios from urban bus to point-to-point shuttle services such as airport-hotel and suburban short-distance transportation.

You can find more about this electric vehicle in the Chariot Motors brochure here, and on the sustainable-bus.com

In the monthly issue of Kamioni magazine (for the months of July – August 2023) an article was published by the company Chariot Motors, looking at the advantages of fast-charging ultracapacitor (UC) technology in electric buses used in sustainable urban transport today.

Some of the technology’s advantages include:

• The duration of UC charging is several minutes. It is carried out by charging stations with a power of the order of 400-500 kW, which, depending on the available network, are supplied with direct or alternating current.
• One of the great advantages of electric buses with UC is that, using fast charging stations located at final stops, they can run for 24 hours, since charging each one takes 5-8 minutes, as well as the mandatory rest of the driver.
• The sequential charging of UC e-buses allows for a relatively constant load on the electrical grid during their working hours.
• Years of operation confirm that the UC is the best technology in terms of safety. UCs do not ignite or explode in accidents, making them very safe.
• The limit on the number of charging cycles for UCs is negligible compared to that of batteries. The AOWEI supercapacitor comes with a 10-year warranty, a level unattainable for batteries that have half the factory warranty.

­In the article, the company’s technical director, Mr. Ilko Ivanov, answers the question: Why are fast-charging UC electric buses more suitable for the city of Sofia?

” In small cities with a relatively light transport task, preferences tend towards the slow-charging BEV technology. In Sofia, with its busy transport scheme, the fast-charging technology with UC is preferred due to the available prerequisites for easy integration of charging stations. The charging of UC electric buses is calculated in their operating cycle, at stations located where drivers rest. Built at the time far-sightedly, with a large reserve, the structure of the metropolitan electric network for trams and trolleybuses copes with the heavy load during the rapid charging of UC electric buses. The fast-charging stations in Sofia have sufficient power, using directly from the RS (rectifier stations) direct current with a voltage of 650 V DC, which is used to power the contact network for the trolleybus and tram lines.

For comparison, during the night slow charging of 100 BEV electric buses for the next day’s journey, with each of them drawing 40 kW, one power plant must be operating. Building and fitting such new infrastructure into city centres is expensive and difficult.”

At Chariot Motors, we take pride in:

• The fact that we know the UC fast charging technology best in Europe and have sold over 70 UC electric buses in big European cities, as well as numerous pilot projects.
• The charging structure we use is entirely developed and manufactured in Bulgaria.

Read the full article on the advantages of Chariot’s fast-charging UC technology and electric buses.