Last Saturday the all-electric bus travelled the streets of Bruges with many of the busworld Europe visitors on board. busworld Europe is the largest trade show for public road transport professionals. Leclanché, a Swiss manufacturer of battery storage technologies headquartered in Yverdon-les-Bains in the canton of Vaud, equipped the bus with an on-board battery pack, integrated electric drive train, charging system and a cloud-based fleet operations software. Three fully electric buses were handed over to the Flanders public transport company, De Lijn.
In a news release, Stefan Louis, Leclanché’s chief strategy officer, points out the advantages of electric buses with an electronic connection via a cloud service: dynamic route simulation and system planning programmes that optimise fleet operations and remote monitoring, as well as complete system solutions with made-to-measure lithium-ion battery packs, infrastructure such as chargers and fully integrated electric drive trains. According to Louis, this enables clients to optimise fleet operations through better energy management and safer operations.
Flemish minister for mobility Ben Whyte says: “With modern, fast and comfortable vehicles we can seduce more Flemish people to use our public transport. The electric buses are not only the cleanest but also the most quiet of the country. This is really an investment in the future.”