As the diesel engine of Lekita Conley’s school bus idles, it shakes the seasonal decorations she has hanging from the ceiling. Easter eggs swing near the front of the bus, while Valentine’s Day hearts dangle in the back.
“I just try to keep the bus energy, you know?” Conley said. “Because we're the first person that the kids see, and I try to start the day off with something positive. Oh, they love their bus.”
Next year, when Conley gets a brand-new, all-electric bus, she plans to decorate that one, too. Conley’s employer, the Ritenour School District, is converting almost all of its bus fleet to electric in the next year thanks to a grant from the federal government.
On Tuesday, officials from the Environmental Protection Agency presented large ceremonial checks to two St. Louis-area school districts to announce the funding. The Ritenour district is receiving $9.5 million to purchase 24 new electric school buses, which will mean every daily bus route will be completely electric. In the Ferguson-Florissant School District, $6.3 million will pay for 16 buses, out of a fleet of about 75.
The vehicles are coming from the EPA’s Clean School Bus Program, a federal initiative to get students onto electric school buses across the country. The program plans to spend $5 billion over five years from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act.
“Eventually, we would love to see all electric school buses instead of diesel,” said Meg McCollister, administrator of EPA Region 7, which includes Missouri.
The grant pays for both the buses and the charging infrastructure. Both Ferguson-Florissant and Ritenour worked with Ameren as they applied for the funding, said Ken Kresyman, Ameren’s business development manager for fleet electrification.
“It's very important to work with the utility upfront, because this is a new type of deployment, right?” Kresyman said. “So most schools are already built. They already have connections with utilities. So this is a new type of load.”
Already, some school districts in rural parts of Missouri have received their buses and are putting them to use, but now electric buses are coming to St. Louis. The EPA also has promised to send them to Riverview Gardens, Normandy Schools Collaborative, St. Louis Public Schools, Hancock Place, Granite City, East St. Louis and Cahokia.
Right now, the EPA is prioritizing high-need, rural and tribal school districts for the funding. It is part of the Biden administration’s Justice40 initiative, which seeks to send 40% of the benefits of certain federal investments to communities that are overburdened by environmental pollution.
“This program addresses critical health concerns related to air pollution, particularly in communities disproportionately affected by diesel emissions, especially communities of color,” said Ferguson-Florissant School District Superintendent Joseph Davis.
The buses do not have tailpipe emissions, which means fewer greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change and also fewer pollutants potentially harming children’s lungs.
“Ultimately, we're trying to make sure that we have cleaner air for kids and cleaner air for everyone,” McCollister said.
For the bus drivers in the Ritenour School District, there’s one benefit that’s even more exciting than the environmental upsides — air conditioning. The drivers in the crowd cheered when that new feature was mentioned. Conley said it’s especially top of mind after temperatures reached 80 degrees Monday, breaking the record for that day.
“These buses do get hot,” Conley said. “Yesterday, one of my kindergarten kids said, ‘Bus driver, cut the heat off.’ I said, ‘Baby, there's no heat on. It’s just hot.”
The timeline for delivery of the school buses is still being worked out, but both districts hope to have the buses by the end of the year. They will be taking young students to school soon after that.
