Some 232 electric buses will return to service.
RATP announced the return to the roads next summer of electric buses manufactured by the Bolloré group subsidiary Bluebus which had been withdrawn from circulation in spring 2022 after two fires in the battery packs.
“RATP, Île-de-France Mobilités and Bluebus have concluded an agreement putting an end to ongoing discussions between RATP and Bluebus,” said the Régie, confirming information revealed by La Lettre A on Monday.
According to the publication, Bluebus will have to “pay a substantial invoice”, the amount of which was not specified, to compensate the RATP.
Letter A refers to “several tens of millions of euros”.
In total, 232 electric buses have been immobilized since April 29, 2022. Their return to service includes the 148 buses taken out of operation at the time “to which are added the Bluebus buses which remained to be received at the time of the incident” , according to RATP.
The two vehicles destroyed in April 2022 were from the same Bluebus 5SE series, from the Bolloré brand.
There were no casualties, but the fires broke out suddenly, causing molten metal to spray several meters around the buses, which were completely destroyed in the fire.
The Bolloré group said a month after having found the main cause of the fires, attributed to “the assembly of an electronic component on a given series”.
Bluebus uses in-house lithium metal polymer (LMP) battery technology, a competitor to the ubiquitous lithium-ion batteries.
The hypothesis of a “short circuit”
These batteries must remain at a minimum temperature of nearly 60 degrees at all times to function.
Thus, cars that are equipped with it always consume a little electricity, even when stationary, which requires them to be left plugged in when they are not in use.
The Land Transport Accident Investigation Office (BEA-TT) produced an information note last June on the progress of their investigation.
“The most probable hypothesis of these fires lies in a short circuit between cells or internal to certain cells constituting the packs” of batteries, he writes in this note.
The BEA-TT also recommends providing “devices to warn drivers of any malfunction likely to lead to fires”.
The final report of this investigation should be revealed in the first half of 2024.