Federal Ministry of Transport has launched a new funding programme to support the procurement of electric and fuel cell buses in Germany, with the government targeting the deployment of around 1,500 additional zero-emission buses nationwide.
The ministry said the programme, backed by a budget of up to 500 million euros for 2026, would support battery-electric buses, battery-overhead line buses and fuel cell buses, as well as conversions of conventional buses to zero-emission powertrains.
The initiative replaces the previous subsidy directive introduced in 2021, which expired at the end of 2025 and had supported the purchase of roughly 3,000 battery-electric buses.
Under the new scheme, operators will continue receiving support for the additional cost of low-emission buses compared with diesel-powered vehicles, although subsidy rates will be reduced.
Operators with lower levels of fleet electrification will be eligible for funding covering up to 70% of the additional costs, while other operators will receive up to 55%, compared with the previous funding rate of 80%.
The federal government will also continue covering up to 40% of costs related to charging infrastructure, hydrogen refuelling stations and maintenance facilities. Funding support remains capped at 30 million euros per company and investment project.
“We have already invested around 1.5 billion euros in more than 5,300 climate-friendly buses,” said Patrick Schnieder, Germany’s federal transport minister.
“We are consistently continuing this successful path: with the budget available in 2026 alone, we aim to deploy a further 1,500 battery-electric buses across the country,” Schnieder said. “This strengthens public transport, accelerates the market ramp-up of innovative drive technologies, and paves the way for climate-friendly mobility.”
The ministry said the revised funding structure is intended to improve the efficiency of public spending by taking into account operators’ electrification levels and operational requirements.
The programme will be divided into two categories, described as an “activation programme” and a “scaling programme,” with projects selected through a competitive process evaluating implementation feasibility and operational concepts.
Applications for the funding programme will open on May 26, 2026, and close on July 21, 2026. NOW GmbH and Projektträger Jülich will administer the scheme.
The ministry said the first implementation phase is expected to support up to 150 transport operators.
Nikolaus Oberkandler, Head of the Electric Mobility and Charging Infrastructure Division at the Federal Ministry for Transport, previously said the ministry did not intend to significantly overhaul the programme structure despite planned adjustments to funding caps and subsidy rates.
“We have a programme that works, that transport operators have accepted well and that manufacturers also support effectively,” Oberkandler said earlier this year. “We do not intend to change everything. We want to continue operating within the existing framework.”
The latest programme follows a temporary funding gap triggered in 2023 after a ruling by Germany’s Constitutional Court affected financing from the Climate and Transformation Fund. In the final funding round under the previous scheme, 151 companies received a combined 417 million euros to support the procurement of 1,887 electric buses.
