Mid-Atlantic Electric School Bus Experience Project
These days, it seems like every automaker offers a plug-in electric model. Well now, we’re seeing an upturn in the number of larger passenger vehicles making that EV switch too. So, for millions of school students, that means their ride to school is about to get cleaner and quieter.
Nearly every day, in virtually every community and neighborhood around the country, 500,000 yellow buses hit the streets, transporting 26 million children to and from school. Taken as a whole, school buses make up the nation’s largest public transportation network, but about 95% of those buses run on diesel fuel. That puts the most vulnerable members of our populace at risk for respiratory problems and other issues linked to breathing exhaust fumes.
The recent growth of electrification for cars and trucks presents an opportunity to change that, and the recent infrastructure law includes two and a half billion dollars in federal aid, specifically to help school districts purchase zero-emission electric school buses and an equal amount for other low emission and electrified vehicles.
But making the electric switch requires education for those who will manufacture, purchase and use those buses, and that’s where programs like MEEP come into play. Meep is the Mid-Atlantic Electric School Bus Experience Project, spearheaded by the Virginia Clean Cities coalition and begun with funding from the US Department of Energy in 2019.
MEEP is working with bus manufacturers, school districts, and other partners to provide hands-on experience and extended demonstration loans of electric school buses to school bus fleets throughout Virginia, Maryland, DC, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey over the next two years.
ALLEYN HARNED: We’ve kicked off the program and already done more than twenty successful demonstrations, as well as six virtual events. This has led to the deployment of 100 electric school buses within the region.
JOHN DAVIS: This bus, known as Jouley, is manufactured by Thomas Built Buses in North Carolina, using an electric propulsion system developed by Proterra, and already proven through 8 million service miles on electric transit buses across America. Jouley has a driving range of about 138 miles and can recharge in just 3 hours using a DC fast charger.
JIM BEASLEY: Well, the routes that it runs. It runs in the AM and the PM mostly, predominantly. They’re easy to charge because there’s downtime in between, and they’re sitting overnight. They’re quiet, they run through the neighborhoods, and they’re non-polluters.
JOHN DAVIS: the electrification of school buses is gaining a groundswell of support from community leaders, parents and the students themselves.
SPEAKER: I am so proud of our students and the awareness they have, and they know now is the time to take the environmental legacy into their hands.
PAUL D’ANDRADE: And the main thing is about our kids, you know. We want them to have the opportunity to have zero emission buses, to have a nice quiet ride, and less effects on their health.
Our total amount of buses is just over 1600. We have eight electric buses, and we have ten we should get sometime next school year, and we put in the application for another grant for an additional ten.
JOHN DAVIS: Electrifying our nation’s school bus fleet won’t happen overnight. That 2-and-a-half billion dollars is expected to add about 10,000 electric buses to the national total over the next five years; but it’s an investment that will continue to pay huge dividends in awareness and one that will drive us towards a cleaner future for generations to come.
Electric Nation
Electric vehicle charging is now readily available in most areas of the country and along major travel routes, but many smaller communities find themselves behind the clean energy curve when it comes to EV infrastructure. Well, here’s a look at one group that’s banding together to help create an electric nation.
The upper Midwest inter-tribal EV charging community network, which the project team named Electric Nation, is an EV infrastructure project serving tribal members on 23 Native American reservations across five states. Aided by U.S. Department of Energy funding, this public-private partnership will introduce 60 level 2 chargers, along with 19 light- and medium-duty plug-in electric vehicles, directly into these communities, empowering them to expand their fuel diversity and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
ROBERT BLAKE: It always seems that these communities are always last to receive this type of investment. How do rural communities participate in this energy transition? Well, this is a perfect opportunity for rural communities to be a part of that transition.
JOHN DAVIS: Electric Nation chose their plug-in vehicles carefully, closely matching each one’s range and capabilities to their intended use. Sitting Bull College, in the Standing Rock nation of North Dakota, uses this Ford E-Transit to shuttle students between campus and local destinations. Traveling about 140 miles daily closely matches the van’s range, and allows it to recharge fully overnight.
Two new electric school buses will clear the air for Red Lake, Minnesota students, who often spend hours aboard for their daily school commutes. This family and child services office in Red Lake nation is now using electric vehicles to transport individuals around the region for appointments, and deliver meals to elder residents. Boosting economic development for these traditionally disadvantaged areas is equally important.
Vehicles and chargers deployed at key businesses like the Red Lake fishery, trading post and even a buffalo farm, will enable them to stay competitive by reducing fuel costs and to work clean at the same time. Miles and miles of gravel farm roads are the norm around these parts, so the F-150 Lightning will be especially useful here.
The Electric Nation project is building on the idea of the National Alternative Fuel Corridors, where designated highways, now covering parts of all 50 states, are populated with EV chargers, and clean fuel stations for natural gas, propane and hydrogen.
Linking the tribal lands across this vast midwestern landscape will be 55 DC fast chargers on popular travel corridors and along tourist routes like the Native American Scenic Byway in South Dakota, and at several tribal casinos.
ROBERT BLAKE: A lot of tribal nations, through our cultural teachings, have a connection to the planet and to the environment, and so being able to reduce our need for fossil fuels is something that speaks to our cultural heritage.
JOHN DAVIS: The Electric Nation project is analyzing how these electric vehicles perform, especially in extreme cold weather, and includes EV education, outreach and engagement so that the successes here can be replicated in other parts of the country.
It seems only fitting that those with the longest ties to our natural history are taking the biggest strides towards a clean future.