All eight newly acquired SOR electric buses ready for service in Opava

According to an announcement on 8 September by Městský dopravní podnik Opava (MDPO), the operator responsible for public transport in the Czech city of Opava, all eight SOR ENS 12 battery-electric solo buses acquired by the city this year have now entered service. SOR Libchavy won the contract to supply the vehicles back in November 2024, after submitting a lower-priced bid than Iveco’s local representative in the tender. The total value of the investment is CZK 106,576,500 (equivalent to a little over HUF 1.6 billion), of which the purchase price of the buses accounts for CZK 98.4 million. The remaining amount covered the procurement and installation of the charging infrastructure, the latter carried out by ČEZ ESCO at the operator’s depot.

The first two vehicles of the eight-strong batch entered service in the eastern Czech town on 19 February, with SOR delivering the remaining six units gradually over the course of the year. Costing CZK 12.3 million each, or more than HUF 185 million, the three-door electric buses have a 2-2-2 door arrangement and capacity for 92 passengers. Their equipment includes, among other features, heat-pump air conditioning, onboard WiFi and USB charging sockets. The vehicles, fitted with electrical equipment from Czech company RAIL Electronics CZ, have traction battery packs with a nominal total capacity of either 274 or 411 kWh – sources are not clear on this point – but in any case the manufacturer guarantees a range of at least 230 kilometres on a single charge.

The vehicles are charged via a CCS Combo 2 plug-in connector. The charging infrastructure installed at MDPO’s central bus and trolleybus garage in the Kylešovice district consists of a central station with a total output of 540 kW and eight charging stations operating as sub-units. Depending on current requirements, this setup enables both fast daytime charging and slower overnight charging, optimising energy use. In addition, a 40 kW portable DC charger is available as a backup solution. The parties have agreed warranty periods of 78 months for the vehicles and 120 months for the charging system.

The electric buses, added to the fleet under numbers 401 to 408, have also been given names in keeping with Opava tradition, this time by pupils from local primary schools. Based on the children’s ideas, the city’s latest acquisitions will operate under the names Elektru Duhoň, Dráček Elektrobusáček, Peříčkobus, Květobus, Ekolog, Glóbus, Knoflobus and Emoji, which can be seen on the front of each vehicle.

Trolleybus operation has a tradition of more than seven decades in Opava – in recent years, from the manufacturing side, the main beneficiaries of this have been the pairing of SOR and Škoda Electric – but battery-electric buses are only now beginning to replace the diesel fleet. As the next step in the process, a further 11 new battery-electric buses are expected to arrive by 2028, which could also be supplied by a consortium of SOR and the Škoda Group. Interestingly, MDPO has already ordered these with two-pole current collectors, enabling the vehicles to be charged from the existing trolleybus overhead wiring. It therefore appears that Škoda’s unusual two-pole current-collector charging solution, which has been on the market for almost a decade, is slowly but surely finding buyers, at least in Czechia and in Slovakia, which in many respects is still treated as part of its orbit.

Photos: Městský dopravní podnik Opava, a.s.