UP government to deploy 700 electric buses in 14 cities

Virendra Singh Rawat

Lucknow / Feb 9, 2021

The Uttar Pradesh government is planning to deploy 700 electric buses in 14 cities with an investment of more than Rs 1,100 crore on the fleet and the charging infrastructure costs.

The green mobility project, which was cleared by the Yogi Adityanath cabinet in October 2019, was delayed due to the pandemic last year. However, the state has put the proposal in top gear so that these buses could start to ply in select urban centres soon.

Recently, UP urban development minister Ashutosh Tandon has directed officials to expedite the process of acquiring the electric buses for an early deployment.

Under phase II of Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of (Hybrid &) Electric Vehicles (FAME) Scheme of the Centre, 11 cities viz. Lucknow, Meerut, Prayagraj (Allahabad), Agra, Ghaziabad, Kanpur, Varanasi, Moradabad, Aligarh, Jhansi and Bareilly were selected by the union heavy industries and public enterprises ministry for plying of 600 midi air-conditioned electric buses. In addition, the state proposed to ply 100 electric buses in 3 other towns as well namely Gorakhpur, Shahjahanpur and Mathura-Vrindavan.

Earlier, the state had cleared the bidding document to run these buses on ‘gross cost contract model’ by selecting the operator through an open bidding. The central government will incur 33 per cent of the cost of these buses procured under the FAME Scheme.

Each midi electric bus is expected to cost Rs 1.3 crore (total Rs 910 crore for 700 buses) and the charging infra will entail total investment of Rs 175 crore (one charger for 4 buses). Besides, each electric bus depot would incur an additional expenditure of Rs 2.32 crore, which pegs the total project cost at more than Rs 1,100 crore.

Currently, 40 air-conditioned electric buses are being plied in the state capital of Lucknow under the flagship scheme to promote electric vehicles (EV) for public mobility in India.

According to an earlier estimate of the state, nearly 200,000 charging stations would be set up in UP to cater to the public and private EVs. The Adityanath government is looking at attracting private investment of Rs 40,000 crore by 2024-25 and creation of 50,000 new job opportunities in the sector under the new state EV policy.