Nearly 80 old trolleybuses and minibuses in the municipalities of Chisinau and Bălți are to be replaced at the first stage of the Clean Urban Public Transport Program. The first stage has a budget of about US$19.1 million. The program forms part of a project that is financed in the framework of the EU4Environment Program, IPN reports.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Regional Development and Environment said the project aims to support the implementation of modern public transport services by using clean fuels, such as compressed natural gas and liquefied petroleum gas and electricity generated from renewable sources. This way, greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution in national urban centers will be reduced.
In the launch of the project, secretary of state at the Ministry Dorin Andros said the relaucnh of discussions on green public investments and ecological and clean public transport is conditional upon the existing environmental, economic and social challenges. Moldova aims to implement the objectives of the European Green Deal that envisions the promotion of the values of economic development in harmony with the environment, green principles in all the sectors, sustainable public transport and circular economy.
There are two scenarios for the second stage – the offering of 735 new urban and suburban vehicles with a value of about US$150 million and the offering of about 2,500 urban, suburban and interurban vehicles with an investment cost of approximately US$500 million.
The Clean Urban Public Transport in Moldova Program will be implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture, Regional Development and Environment and the Ministry of Economy and Infrastructure with the assistance of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) within the EU4Environment Program.
