Hybrid buses are nothing new but this one in particular is special. Toyota’s Hino division is responsible of building this hybrid electric bus with a diesel engine and a set of batteries (here comes the nice part) that apparently won’t use a plug to charge but will use a wireless charging system built on the road.

The system is supposed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 60 percent but the first thing I could think of, is that the wireless transfer of energy may not be efficient. Probably less than half the energy is going to be actually transmitted and stored.

The system uses a series of inductive coils. One is installed on the bottom of the bus while the others are built in the concrete and resonate energy at a certain frequency and the buses will probably have to follow a certain path in order to recharge.

The system has potential and Hino will probably build a fully electric vehicle that will have zero emissions, when they solve the efficiency problems (if there are any). Meanwhile the buses are being tested for two weeks on a 4.2 km route at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport.

Asahi via Carectomy