One South African company buys 25 million litres of diesel a year

Golden Arrows has begun rolling out its fleet of electric buses to gradually replace its existing diesel-powered vehicles, which burn around 25 million litres of diesel each year. 

This is expected to translate into significant savings for the company, which it hopes to pass on to commuters in Cape Town. 

However, this will take some time, with Golden Arrows having over 1,000 buses in its fleet, which serve over 200,000 people daily on 1,300 routes. 

Golden Arrows has been in operation for over 160 years. It was founded in 1861 as a horse-drawn tram service between Sea Point and Cape Town’s city centre. 

Created by an Act of government, the company was first called the Cape Town & Green Point Tramway Company and operated solely with horse-drawn trams for the first thirty years. 

By 1894, the company had shifted to electric trams as a far more efficient alternative to horse-drawn trams. This kicked off a period of significant changes for the company. 

Within twenty years, buses would replace the trams alongside some trackless electric trams just before World War II. 

After the war, Cape Tramways Limited, then with a fleet of over 500 buses and 2,000 employees, dominated transport across Cape Town. 

However, a much smaller company, Golden Arrows Bus Services, completed a takeover of the company in 1957 and used its expanded scale to develop the Arrowgate depot in Montana, Cape Town. 

At the time, it was the largest and most modern depot in Southern Africa. The company would replicate this depot in similar constructions in Philippi, Woodstock, Simon’s Town, and Atlantis. 

Golden Arrows continued to grow organically until the early 2000s, when Hosken Consolidated Investments snapped it up. 

The company has continued to innovate, becoming one of the first companies to operate a corridor of Cape Town’s MyCiTi bus service. 

Growing from a small horse-drawn tram company, Golden Arrows now operates 1,171 buses across 1,300 routes with over 2,500 staff members. 

Its buses are estimated to drive 59.7 million kilometres and use 25 million litres of diesel each year. 

Electric bus rollout

Most Golden Arrows’ buses are diesel-powered MAN vehicles, with the company purchasing over 500 units from the German manufacturer. 

In 2021, the company began testing electric buses on some of its routes around Cape Town, making it the first implementation of electric buses in Africa. 

After a few years of testing the three electric buses on various routes around the city, Golden Arrows sealed a deal with the Chinese giant BYD for hundreds of electric buses. 

So far, the company has taken delivery of twenty buses from BYD, with it expecting to have over 100 in its fleet by the end of the year. 

This means that within a period of 12 months, Golden Arrows would have replaced around 10% of its existing fleet with electric alternatives. 

The BYD buses require a two-hour charge for a range of 300 kilometres. Golden Arrows has 30 charging stations across its depot and expects to double the number of chargers by the end of the year. 

Golden Arrows expects these electric buses to help it save millions of rands it would have spent on diesel each year, with savings being passed on to consumers in the form of lower prices. 

“I don’t think people know that we buy 25 million litres of diesel every single year. That is a huge amount of diesel, and the savings from generating our own electricity to charge these buses will be significant,” spokesperson Bronwen Dyke-Beyer said.

“We are looking at this as a long-term measure to ensure we are not as heavily impacted by the diesel price in South Africa.” 

Dyke-Beyer explained that it has become harder for the company to pass on the rising cost of operating diesel buses onto consumers, with fuel prices increasing significantly in the past decade.