Vadodara: ChargeZone and Fresh Bus have announced a major expansion of their electric mobility partnership, with Fresh Bus set to deploy an additional 400 all-electric intercity buses using ChargeZone’s charging network over the next 15 months.
The expansion will increase the Fresh Bus fleet supported by ChargeZone infrastructure five-fold, from 100 buses to 500, while extending operations across 20 cities and 17 additional towns in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
To support the larger fleet, ChargeZone will install 30 MW of additional charging capacity, taking the dedicated infrastructure serving Fresh Bus from the existing 10 MW to a total of 40 MW.
The new infrastructure will also form part of ChargeZone’s wider plan to add 200 MW of charging capacity across its national network.
At full scale, the companies estimate that the partnership will deliver around 100 million units of energy annually and support more than 20,000 passenger journeys each day. They also project an annual reduction of approximately 9,000 to 10,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions.
The scale of the project highlights an increasingly important part of India’s electric vehicle transition: commercial and public transport, where vehicles clock considerably more kilometres than the average private car and therefore place rather different demands on charging infrastructure. In other words, an electric bus cannot simply wait around for a convenient plug socket.
Kartikey Hariyani, Founder & CEO of ChargeZone, said: “India’s EV transition will not be driven by personal vehicles alone. Commercial mobility, particularly intercity public transport, can play a critical role in taking electrification to scale because these vehicles operate frequently, travel longer distances and depend on predictable infrastructure. Our partnership with Fresh Bus has shown that when charging capacity, uptime and energy availability are built around the needs of fleet operations, operators can scale electric mobility with greater confidence. This expansion is about taking that proven model to more routes and demonstrating how charging infrastructure can enable intercity public transport to electrify at scale.”
ChargeZone describes itself as India’s largest EV charging network, with more than 15,000 charging points. Its partnership with Fresh Bus is focused specifically on creating charging capacity suited to the regular schedules and high utilisation of intercity electric buses.
Fresh Bus, meanwhile, operates an all-electric intercity bus service. The expansion to 500 buses represents a substantial increase in its operating footprint and will test how effectively large electric fleets can function across multiple long-distance corridors.
Sudhakar Reddy, Founder of Fresh Bus, said: “When we started Fresh Bus, the biggest question wasn’t whether passengers would choose electric intercity travel, it was whether the charging infrastructure could keep pace with a growing fleet running every day, across every corridor. Our partnership with ChargeZone has answered that question. The reliability of their network is what has allowed us to move from proving the model to scaling it with confidence. Expanding to 500 buses and 40 MW of dedicated charging capacity is not just a fleet decision, it’s a statement that electric intercity travel can be dependable, affordable, and ready for the passengers. This is what public electric mobility in India should look like: comfortable for the commuter, sustainable for the planet, and built to scale.”
The project comes as charging availability and reliability remain central considerations in the expansion of electric commercial fleets. Unlike private EVs, intercity buses operate to fixed schedules, cover long distances and require predictable access to high-capacity charging to avoid disrupting services.
By combining a five-fold increase in buses with dedicated charging infrastructure, the ChargeZone-Fresh Bus partnership will provide a sizeable real-world test of whether electric intercity transport can be expanded beyond individual routes into a broader regional network.
If the planned deployment proceeds on schedule, the initiative could also offer a useful model for other transport operators seeking to electrify long-distance public mobility — a segment where the environmental gains can be significant, but where reliability must ultimately matter just as much as the size of the battery.
