A more specific example is the city of Shenzhen.
What is intriguing is the question of when the buses will be charged. If the buses are most active during peak traffic periods, they can be recharged during the day using solar PV-derived electricity for the evening commute; this would presumably help soak up mid-day peak solar PV production in places that have adopted solar. But for the morning commute, the buses would probably be charged at night using fossil fuels (or wind or nuclear).
Another intriguing question is if this is an example of "disruptive innovation", in which a cheaper, inferior technology finds a niche, improves over time, and then unexpectedly becomes the dominant technology. If everyone is laughing at a technology like electric buses, it might be worth investing in it before it takes off.
In any case, the emergences of the electric bus as a viable mode of transport comes as a surprise.
Another issue with regard to the new viability of electric buses might be the relative irrelevance of the USA in the 21st century in terms of promoting innovation through public policy. For example, solar PV prices have fallen precipitously because the German government subsidized the purchase of solar panels and the Chinese government in turn subsidized the production of solar panels. Thus, the USA was not a central player in the solar PV price decline. The emerging viability of electric buses has likewise resulted from public policy in urban China, not the USA.
On another note....
As a thought experiment, what might have been the role of buses in American society if the USA had not engaged in building the federal highway system?
The Federal Highway Act of 1956 was initiated by President Eisenhower as a military policy to help enable the US military move across the country in an emergency and to enable civilians to retreat from cities during a nuclear attack. It was not primarily intended for civilian transportation or commuting.
The highways contributed greatly to the mushrooming of suburbs in the postwar period. There were also other factors, like new technology that made suburban homes quick and easy to build (developers like the Toll Brothers could build one house a day in this period, for example). This helped to address two decades of pent up demand for housing, as little had been built during the 1930s and 1940s.
In an alternate reality -- without the Great Depression or without WW2 or without the Cold War -- the highways and the suburbs might not have been built on the scale that they were. In this case, what might have happened instead would have been the expansion of cities and the important role therein of high capacity transit systems in high-density areas. But that might not have resonated with what the public wanted (and still wants), which was (and is) suburban life.
Another example of how the developmental path of the USA could have been different might be found in the work of the urban planner Donald Shoup. One of the consequences of reliance on the automobile in the postwar period was that providing private, on-site parking was mandated by law for occupants of buildings such as businesses and apartments -- a requirement that seems perfectly reasonable on the face of it. According to Shoup, however, this requirement only reinforced the commuting dyad (suburbs & automobiles) at the expense of the urban dyad (high-density development & mass transit). This requirement of private parking ironically resulted in promoting rather than alleviating traffic congestion.
One problem with Shoup's research is that although his counterintuitive insights make for refreshing reading, the average person neither understands the theory nor desires the outcome. (For example, one might logically deduce that all street parking should be metered and that this would solve myriad problems, but explaining that to the public is like arguing with a two-year-old child.)
