- Europe-wide passenger transport operator, Arriva, has placed an order for 187 fully-electric buses to join its fleet in the Netherlands.
- This includes 157 units from manufacturer VDL, and an additional 30 from Solaris.
- The significant addition will operate in the Netherlands’ region of West Brabant, significantly helping to decarbonise the nation’s public transport fleet.
New electric buses for the Netherlands
Both the 157 VDL buses, and 30 Solaris buses, will have battery capacities around the 400 kWh mark, which should allow for a bus to finish a whole day without charging up – even less of an ask for an EV, in a country as flat as the Netherlands. All 157 of these buses will join the fleet by July next year.
For the West Brabant region, Arriva notes that soon, over 90% of the public transport taken in the area will now be by electric bus. This drives towards a goal for Arriva to have net-zero operations in the region, as soon as 2027, while it hopes for its entire Dutch operations to emit zero emissions at a later date.
Olivier Michard, Chief Commercial Officer at Solaris Bus & Coach, commented on Arriva’s order:
“Arriva’s order of 30 electric buses is an important step towards greener mobility solutions in the Netherlands. We are very happy to continue our cooperation by introducing another zero-emission technology – besides hydrogen – to Arriva’s fleet. We strongly believe that e-mobility is a key to the global transformation of transport”.
Anne Hettinga, Managing Director of Arriva Netherlands, added:
“With this order of electric buses, we are delivering on our promises and building on our high levels of service and our track record of sustainable transport solutions. We look forward to working with the local passenger transport authorities to grow public transport in the region”.

Arriva’s drive for electric buses, particularly in the Netherlands, has already been impressive. In the Dutch province of Limburg, over 50% of Arriva’s bus fleet in the area was already zero-emission, whilst it targets a fully-electric fleet in that particular region, by 2026.