Government opens line of 90 million to purchase electric and hydrogen buses

The incentive system, whose regulations were published this Monday in Diário da República, is financed by the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR) and aims to decarbonize public transport. According to the ordinance signed by the Minister of the Environment, Duarte Cordeiro, the financing is intended to support transport companies, municipalities, metropolitan areas and inter-municipal communities in the purchase of “clean buses” for public passenger service, including the installation of electricity charging or hydrogen refueling infrastructure.

Each candidate can obtain a maximum benefit of 12 million euros. “The maximum amount of public financing to be allocated per clean bus to be acquired cannot exceed the following amounts: 270,000 euros, in the case of a clean electric bus; and 470,000 euros (four hundred and seventy thousand euros), in the case of a clean powered bus hydrogen. The Government commits to 100% financing of “total eligible expenses”.

Urgent and unpostponable decision

Of the PRR’s 90 million euros, 45 million will finance the purchase of electric and hydrogen buses in the metropolitan areas of Porto and Lisbon. There are 45 million left to apply to the remaining territories of the continent.

Municipalities, metropolitan areas and public transport operators can purchase vehicles for the following services: public municipal and intercity passenger transport service; public interregional passenger transport service, provided that they are operated under public service contracts; flexible public passenger transport service, in which case companies, legal entities or individuals licensed to transport by taxi, nor private social solidarity institutions, cannot be the beneficiaries; and Public school transport service at municipal level.

The Minister of the Environment, Duarte Cordeiro, justifies the publication of the incentive system regulation at a time when the Government is in management. The government official understands that the launch of this support for the renewal and reinforcement of public transport fleets is “urgent, urgent and indispensable, not only because it will have a very relevant impact on promoting the use of public transport, through strengthening the offer, increasing comfort and quality of service provided, but also densifies mechanisms for implementing public policies for sustainable and ecologically responsible mobility, crucial to the decarbonization of mobility, contributing to the energy transition of the transport sector and the increase in the incorporation of renewable energies in the sector of public road passenger transport”.

Hence, Duarte Cordeiro emphasizes that “the non-publication of this ordinance would always result in serious harm to the public interest, postponing the approval of policies to encourage the ecological and sustainable transition of the public transport sector, which would add to the non-compliance with the commitments assumed in the scope of the PRR”.