Bucharest – Otopeni Airport and Bucharest – Pitesti will be among the future routes. The total costs of the project are estimated at EUR973 million, VAT not included.
The pilot project, implemented by the Railway Reform Authority, aims to purchase 12,160-seater locomotives, as well as long-term vehicle maintenance and repair services and hydrogen supply.
The pilot project “on the use of locomotives in electric traction based on hydrogen fuel cells, within the obligation of public passenger transport service on non-electrified railway lines” will serve through high frequency services routes north of Bucharest and Ilfov County, in connection with the neighboring counties of Arges, Dambovita and Giurgiu. Due to the reliability of the new vehicles, the trains will reach the counties of Olt and Dolj.
The trains will travel every 30 minutes or every hour on the following routes: North Station and Otopeni Airport Trains; Gara de Nord – Chitila – Sabareni and Titu; Bucharest – Gaesti – Pitesti; Bucharest and Targoviste. There are four trains a day from Bucharest to Slatina – Craiova via the town of Pitesti.
Passengers will be able to board on the train with their bicycles and the trains will enable easy access for people with disabilities.
The financing of the investment project is made from non-reimbursable external funds, through the National Recovery and Resilience Program #PNRR and from the state budget, through the budget of the Transport Ministry.
Replacing diesel traction with electric traction based on hydrogen fuel cells reduces transport pollution by an equivalent of more than EUR600,000 a year and, for example, 18,348 tons of carbon dioxide per year and 306 tons of nitrogen oxide per year, helping to achieve the targets set by European and national strategies to achieve a zero-zero pollution effect in 2050.