Two thirds of American children get to school by car. Aside from walks, Buddy’s transportation preference was the same.
If we’re alert, we’ll notice the many changes being made as American neighborhoods adapt to climate change. Some are obvious - like ugly orange sandbags. Others are harder to notice; after all, electric school buses look just like their diesel counterparts. The fuel doors are a little different, but the slightly more obvious difference is the exhaust pipes. Electric buses don’t have any.
The benefits
There are at least three good things about electric school buses. Two are familiar, the other virtually unknown.
Emissions of CO2 Electric buses produce less than half the greenhouse gas emissions of diesel or propane-powered school buses, even after accounting for emissions for electricity generation.
Emissions of chemicals and soot The tailpipe emissions from a diesel bus have negative impacts on children's health. Driving around the neighborhood and idling in front of the school, diesel buses
expose some 25 million school-aged children to ultrafine particles, sulfur oxides, and nitrogen oxides — all closely linked to asthma, respiratory illness, lung disease, and cancer. [Rebecca Leber, Vox]
Potential for energy storage As America uses more electricity from solar and wind sources, utilities increasingly need ways to store that juice between peak usage times each day. There’s work being done to allow them to pump electricity into a customer’s electric vehicle (EV) battery in their garage and then take a supply out when the utility needs it. A school bus has a much bigger battery than an EV, and it sits idle most of the day. We may soon see those school bus lots tied into the local grid in ways that reduce our utility’s costs. And our own.
The numbers
Electric school buses cost around $400,000 each. For the foreseeable future, virtually none of that will be paid by school district residents.
As of June 2023, almost 6,000 buses had been financed, ordered, delivered or were operating across this country. Many of these are being paid for by the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Clean School Bus Rebate Program. It awarded over $900 million for more than 2,300 electric school buses to 365 school districts in 2022, in its first round of funding. Hundreds of millions of dollars are scheduled this year, with $5 billion designated over the next five years.
Another source of funding: some states are tapping a $2.9 billion trust fund to put cleaner vehicles on their roads. It’s funded by the penalty on Volkswagen for cheating on pollution emissions tests.
What we can do
Eventually we’ll see lots of electric school buses, but not yet. For instance, roughly 10,000 school buses operate in Washington state, and only about 40 of them so far are electric.
School districts and states need to apply for those EPA funds. Maybe we should be asking our local school board where things stand on electric buses, and maybe encouraging some competitive zeal.
We should be aware of two Republican efforts in Congress. The first is to divert much of that EPA money to buy propane and natural gas buses. The second is to wipe out the EPA and, presumably, its Clean School Bus Rebate Program altogether.
What other visual evidence of local climate adaptation will we be seeing in our neighborhoods? More ideas coming.
LEARN, THINK, ACT
All about the clean school bus program [Electric School Bus Business Initiative]
All About Funding and Financing Options for Electric School Buses [ditto]
The propane industry’s weird obsession with school buses, explained [Rebecca Leber, Vox]
Our car will power our house [ClimateDog]
What If Electric School Buses Could Supply Power When Off Duty? [EPA]
The Conservative axe hanging over climate action [ClimateDog]
Something else to look for in spotting electric school busses. Many of them proudly tell us!
Another resource is Highland Fleets which has been operating for a few years and have developed a subscription model for school district acquisition of buses, charging equipment, and administrative oversight. Thus avoiding substantial initial capital costs. We've been talking to them about that model, but in addition, they included the La Conner School District and Stanwood-Camano in their application for Track II of Ecology's Clean School Bus program funding. The awards have not yet been announced. And we hope to submit applications for the Tract III lotery (2024)
In addition, we have contacted PSE Up and Go Program and WSU Green Transportation Program (Established by WA State legislature) for help in identifying and accessing grant funding for buses and required charging equipment, for Local School Districts in Skagit County.
Ambitious. We know, but we're hoping to make some progress.
And