Wrightbus has delivered 24 electric double-decker buses to First Bus in Aberdeen, Scotland, as part of a £12.7 million investment aimed at decarbonising public transport. The buses will operate on routes 1 and 2, which serve Robert Gordon University, the companies announced on Wednesday.
The investment, first confirmed in November 2024, also funded the repowering of 12 diesel buses with electric drivetrains, bringing the total number of zero-emission buses on the university’s campus routes to 36.
See also: First Bus Opens Region’s First Electric Bus Depot in Weston-Super-Mare
The repowered buses are part of a separate order for 30 conversions placed in July 2024 with Wrightbus’ new business unit, NewPower. First Bus was the first customer of the re-powering programme, which launched in June and is designed to retrofit diesel buses with battery-electric drivetrains.
Wrightbus uses battery systems from French supplier Forsee Power, with available capacities between 74 and 84 kWh. While the specific battery variant used in the Aberdeen conversions was not disclosed, each bus was retrofitted with a Voith Electric Drive System (VEDS), nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) battery packs, and a Grayson HVAC system.
Retrofitting costs are estimated at £200,000 per bus, though First Bus has not revealed how much of the £12.7 million was allocated to conversions versus new vehicles.
The expanded fleet contributes to making First Bus’ Aberdeen operations among the most electrified in the UK. The project is part of a wider £100 million investment in zero-emission transport announced by First Bus at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow in 2021, with funds earmarked for deployment through 2025.
