Aberdeen’s five-year-old hydrogen double-deckers are selling to First Bus for £30,000 each, just 5.4% of their £556,000 average original cost.
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Aberdeen’s hydrogen double-deckers have finally produced a useful market price, and it is more revealing than another theoretical argument about fuel-cell efficiency, hydrogen costs or refuelling infrastructure. First Bus is set to buy 23 Wrightbus StreetDeck Hydroliners for £30,000 each. Aberdeen City Council originally spent about £13.9 million on the 25-bus fleet, an average of roughly £556,000 per vehicle, which means the commercial operator taking almost the entire fleet is paying just 5.4% of the original average acquisition cost. These are not elderly buses being disposed of after 15 years of service. They entered service in 2021 and accumulated only about three and a half years of revenue operation before hydrogen-supply problems left them parked.
The number matters because Aberdeen actually tested the market rather than simply estimating residual value on a spreadsheet. The confidential council briefing obtained by the Press and Journal says Aberdeen received four other bids after approaching the market, including proposals to take buses for free and another offering £1 per vehicle. First’s £30,000 therefore should not be interpreted merely as an unusually aggressive negotiation by a sophisticated buyer. The city went looking for purchasers and discovered what organizations were prepared to pay for relatively young specialist zero-emission vehicles whose original drivetrain no longer had much obvious commercial appeal. When Aberdeen first announced that it wanted to dispose of the fleet, I argued that there was no deep or liquid secondary market for used hydrogen buses. We now have a real transaction against which that proposition can be tested.
