Dutch ‘Superbus’ Gets 155 MPH (VIDEOS)

May 3rd, 2012 by Zachary Shahan

A Chinese “3D Fast Bus” I wrote about in 2010 seemed to get a lot of people excited, getting about 47,000 views on StumbleUpon, but I haven’t heard anything about the bus since then. However, a new Dutch “Superbus” (admittedly, not quite as flashy as the 3D Fast Bus) is already built and hitting the roads, and hopefully it will get a few eyes on it, as well. The bus can go up to 155 mph (~249 kmh) and can carry 23 passengers. I don’t want to think about what a crash would look like — although, the thing looks about as strong as the Batmobile.

Dutch astronaut Wubbo Ockels, a professor of aerospace sustainable engineering and technology, is the man who dreamt up this superbus, and its designer is Antonia Terzi, former chief aerodynamicist of the BMW-Williams Formula 1 team.

Terzi says that the superbus will “tackle the challenges of mobility, spatial planning, service detail and environmental demands all in one.” However, before it does, I imagine a lot will need to be done to bring down its €13 million price tag.

Here’s one more video of the bus, in the wonderful city of Groningen where I once lived for 5 months (gray day in the video, unfortunately).

The bus is made of carbon fiber and fiberglass. It made its world debut at a trade fair in Dubai last month.

Source: Huffington Post

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Tags: buses, dutch bus, Dutch superbus, superbus

About the Author

Zachary Shahan spends most of his time here on CleanTechnica as the director/chief editor. Otherwise, he's probably enthusiastically fulfilling his duties as the director/editor of Solar Love, EV Obsession, Planetsave, or Bikocity. Zach is recognized globally as a solar energy, electric car, and wind energy expert. If you would like him to speak at a related conference or event, connect with him via social media. You can connect with Zach on any popular social networking site you like. Links to all of his main social media profiles are on ZacharyShahan.com.

mdsmbwa

I think you meant 155 mpg in the title.
- mdsmbwa
  
  My bad. Does 155 mph and all-electric at that. Amazing! I should have listened to the video before commenting. Very cool concept. Thanks.
  - http://cleantechnica.com/ Zachary Shahan
    
    Thanks for the follow-up, was just going to double-check and presumably update the article.
tsport100

Do you people ever test this web site in ‘new’ browsers? Using Chrome 18 this entire site has multiple ‘issues’!!!
- http://cleantechnica.com/ Zachary Shahan
  
  i’m sorry, i live on Chrome and have no issues. could you please give us more specifics on the systems you are using and the problems you are having?
  - tsport100
    
    How about giving me an email address to send the screen grab to?
    
    There are multiple faults, but they’re not consistent. Right now I can send you a screen grab that shows none of the images have loaded and the social bookmark buttons normally across the top are aligned vertically OVER the first image.
    
    The most common fault is, the entire page comes up as unformatted text down the left hand side of the page.
    
    If I have time I will screen capture it and email it over.
    - http://cleantechnica.com/ Zachary Shahan
      
      Send it to: zach@importantmedia.org
      
      That would be very helpful. And more helpful would be if you could tell us which systems you’re using as well (what type of computer, what operating system). I haven’t heard about this from anyone else and thorough testing was conducted when we switched over to this theme several months ago.
      
      Thanks.
- http://cleantechnica.com/ Zachary Shahan
  
  & btw, i’m on Chrome 19 (and was on Chrome 18, of course)
  - Bob_Wallace
    
    Me too.
    
    Was on C18 and saw no problems. Now using C19 and experiencing no problems.
    Perhaps tsport had a ‘personal’ problem….
    - tsport100
      
      WTF are you on about!!!??