A NY school district gets electric buses that cost 9 times more than diesel
Power the Future founder Daniel Turner discusses the Trump administration suing California over its truck emissions standards and EV mandates in The Bottom Line.
School districts in several states are facing mandates that must be included electric buses in their fleet of school buses, and EVs come with different operating costs and new challenges.
Several states, including New York and California, have made it mandatory for school districts to purchase zero-emission school buses for their new purchases. New York’s law goes into effect in 2027 for all new school bus purchases and has a broad 2035 transition goal, while California’s new purchase mandate will go into effect in 2035 with five-year extensions available to rural school districts.
Some school districts are going ahead of the curve and experimenting with electric school buses and a new report on operating costs shows that electric school buses present different challenges for school districts than diesel school buses.
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Electric school buses pose new operational challenges for school districts replacing their diesel school bus fleets. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
A News10NBC reports of Rochester, New York, examined the financial impact of the Naples Central School District’s experience with electric buses, as the district used federal grants to purchase two electric buses and related infrastructure that have now been in use by the school for nearly two years.
Transportation director and chief mechanic Pat Elwell told News10NBC that EVs that consumers drive as their own cars are “ahead of the curve” while electric buses “are not there” because “the technology is not there, the batteries are not there.”
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The electric buses offered a smooth ride and did better climbing hills, according to the report. (David L. Ryan/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
He said drivers in the district report that electric buses perform better in other areas such as climbing mountains and traveling smoothly. However, he warned that performance depends on temperature as it works best between 20 and 80 degrees, but temperatures outside that range can have an effect. battery life.
Elwell told the outlet that about half the time this winter, the district has opted to use electric buses since about 20% of their battery will heat the vehicles and that requires daytime charging to ensure they have enough battery for their afternoon routes.
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The report noted that electric buses struggle to maintain their batteries in cold and hot temperatures outside the 20 to 80 degree range. (Stock)
Asked by the agency how electric buses compare to diesel school buses in terms of operating costs, Elwell said the district pays about 36 cents per mile to run its diesel buses — which it noted are sustainable because the district can afford to buy gasoline. government contracts.
“Electricity on the other hand is all over the place because you don’t know from month to month what it’s going to be, so when you start putting in your kilowatt-hours for supply and delivery and all the other costs like you would pay for your diesel bill, we’re paying $3.18 a mile for an electric bus,” he told News10NBC.
Superintendent Kevin Swartz told the outlet that the cost difference between an electric bus and a diesel bus is about $300,000 and because of that difference, the district has no plans to buy more electric buses at this time.
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Swartz said in the report that Naples “is a relatively small district that replaces two buses a year. Typically, that’s $600,000 in additional money that taxpayers will have to come up with and that doesn’t include any charging or infrastructure improvements that we would have to bring if we go forward.”
