Zhongtong Bus, based in Liaocheng, Shandong province, has received an approval document from the Beijing Olympics Organizing Committee, according to the Science and Technology authority of Shandong province.
        A test show the bus can carry around 40 people and a 3-hour charge can support a 250 km range. The streamlined and light weight bus cost around 1.1 degree of electricity per km ( without operating A/C ). The Ministry of Science and Technology and the Beijing Olympics and several Olympics related working panels carried out studies on the bus and put it “the best of bus type, styling and range”.
        A chief scientist of Zhongtong said the bus is in fact a combination the electric powertrain of Beijing Institute of Technology, the battery management system from Beijing Jiaotong University and Zhongtong’s own bus.
        The Zhongtong bus program started in 2005 and it became part of the national 11th 5-year 863 Program the following year.