West Midlands to run 'largest hydrogen bus fleet' due to new funding

The region is set to get 124 new hydrogen vehicles

The West Midlands is set to run the UK's largest hydrogen bus fleet after securing new funding.

The region will get 124 new buses after it won £30m from the Department for Transport to fund a switchover.

Twenty four of the new vehicles will be articulated tram-style buses set to run on a new bus priority route between Walsall, Birmingham and Solihull.

It comes on top of a previous £50m investment to make Coventry the UK's first all-electric bus city.

The funding tops up private bus company investment over the next three years to accelerate the switch from diesel buses to clean and green vehicles, said the West Midlands Combined Authority.

The region was "already leading the way", it said, with 20 hydrogen double decker buses, bought by Birmingham City Council and operated by National Express West Midlands.

It means the region will have 144 hydrogen buses on the streets, "the largest fleet in the western world," it added.