In 2018 I came across a striking fact: 99% of the world’s electric buses were in China. It was there that they were commercialised and produced at scale, and every month Chinese cities were adding more buses to their fleets than the rest of the world put together. The benefits of electric buses did not go unnoticed, running quieter and cleaner on city streets, and everyone else wanted them too. So what would the percentage be now?

Outside of London, which has always loved buses, I saw my firs...