First Bus announces £70m investment in electric buses

First Bus says it will invest 70 million pounds to procure 160 zero-emission buses in the West of England. The announcement comes after the latter received significant government funding to grow the zero-emission fleet there.

Specifically, the West of England Combined Authority secured 19.89 million funds in funding in the second round of the Zero Emission Bus Regional Area (ZEBRA 2) programme to purchase an additional 160 zero-emission buses. Now, operator First Bus says it will foot another 70 million pounds of the bill.

Once the 160 new buses hit the road, half of the operator’s fleet in the West of England will be zero-emission, namely 258 vehicles. Moreover, First Bus says that 27 of the new units will be repowered diesel buses. The company placed an order with Wrightbus’s new business unit NewPower last year to retrofit diesel buses with electric drives.

“We’ve reached a significant milestone today as we invest further in our journey towards a zero-emission bus fleet. We’re thrilled that our people and customers in the West of England will benefit from government co-funding for these transformative projects,” said Janette Bell, Managing Director for First Bus. “We already have over 1000 zero-emission buses on the road serving our customers and this latest investment is another exciting step forward.”

First Bus also recently opened the region’s first electric bus depot, namely in the town of Weston-Super-Mare. The electrification was supported by an approx. €17.7m (£14.9m) investment from First Bus and the national Zero Emissions Bus Regional Areas (ZEBRA) initiative.

firstbus.co.uk