AN ENVIRONMENTALLY friendly bus company is halfway to making its future a whole lot greener.

The Big Lemon has raised more than £50,000 of the £100,000 it needs to bring new electric buses on to the streets of Brighton and Hove.

The firm’s co-founder Tom Druitt said the firm’s fleet of cooking oil fuelled buses had saved 900 tonnes of CO2 emissions since 2007.

But now the company wants to go to the next level of having no emissions and no carbon footprint.

Mr Druitt said the move to electric buses from renewable sources would help reduce the high levels of air pollution currently being emitted along some of Brighton’s busiest roads including North Street.

Currently each of their biodiesel buses emits 836kg of carbon monoxide, 314kg of hydrocarbons, 1419kg of nitrogen oxides and 81kg of particulates – all figures which would be reduced to zero with the new electric buses.

The company has applied for a Government grant towards the cost of three buses. But in order to get the first vehicle the company needs to raise £100,000 themselves.

The Big Lemon has released 1,000 two-year fixed rate community bonds at an interest rate of 6 per cent per annum for £100 each to hit the target.

The firm is expected to make £70,000 profit on a total income of £654,000 total income in 2015.

Anyone interested in helping them hit the target is asked to visit thebiglemon.com/2016/01/29/an-electric-future.