Ostrava purchases more alternative drive cars

The eco-friendly fleet of the city will grow to 65 vehicles in the second half of this year. The city of Ostrava has tendered another 17 alternative drive cars.

 “We are taking a number of steps to improve the air in Ostrava, many of them beyond our legal obligation. In relation to transport, this especially concerns the greening of the City’s fleet. Over the last three years, we have replaced the cars for the municipal police, which only uses compressed natural gas vehicles. We have invested almost CZK 20 million into the greening of the City’s fleet in the Alternative Drive for Ostrava I and II projects”, said Mayor Tomáš Macura.

The City has now tendered 17 new eco-friendly cars, three of which are CNG and fourteen electric cars. These are the Nissan Leaf Acenta, utility electric trucks Alké and Nissan van.

Of the 17 new cars, five are intended for the Ostrava Municipal Police (3x CNG, 2x electric cars) and 12 electric cars (6 passenger cars, 6 trucks) for nine city districts.  Mariánské Hory a Hulváky will get three, Moravská Ostrava a Přívoz two and Hošťálkovice, Hrabová, Krásné Pole, Nová Ves, Ostrava-Jih, Radvanice a Bartovice and Stará Bělá will each get one.

The total purchase cost is CZK 15.4 million, of which the subsidy amounts to CZK 5.4 million. The “Alternative Drive for Ostrava II” project is co-financed by the National Environment Program.

The city offered city districts co-financing from the Environment Fund in the amount of 3 million. “In order to motivate the city districts to participate in this project, in addition to the state subsidy we also offered them a contribution of CZK 200,000 for every car from the city’s Environment Fund. This will put the number of cars purchased this year at 16”, said Deputy Minister for Environment Kateřina Šebestová.

Significant emission reduction

The main reason for the replacement of cars with conventional fuels (petrol, diesel) for electric cars is the proven reduction in road traffic emissions. No pollutants are produced directly in the pedestrian breathing zone. Data show that compared to a diesel vehicle with an average fuel consumption of 5 l/100 km, on a 10,000 km trip, one electric vehicle does not release 1,305 kg of carbon dioxide, 5 kg of nitrogen oxides, 1 kg of airborne dust and nearly 50 kg of sulphur oxides into the air in the breathing zone, i.e. in the streets of the city.

Public transport to get rid of diesel engines

The same plan to go green also applies to public transport vehicles. The transport company has previously said that it will be completely diesel-free by 2020 and its fleet will be based only on electricity, CNG and, in the future, hydrogen. Of the total number of 297 buses, there are already 155 CNGs, 7 electric buses, 7 CNG minibuses (four of which will be put into operation in the first half of 2019) and three electric minibuses. The remaining diesel buses will be replaced by the end of 2020.