Missouri school districts take advantage of electric buses
Walking around his district’s newest school buses, Jake Kloss notes there’s no noticeable differences between these five buses and the other 26 in the parking lot. They’re all yellow, marked with “Cassville R-IV School District” on the side and the controls inside are similarly located. Open the hood, however, and the similarities end.
The new buses are powered by electricity, not diesel. “I’ve put some of these buses on longer routes — like 100 miles per day — just to see how they perform and how we can use these effectively going forward,” says Jake, Cassville School District’s director of transportation. “The kids like them.”
Cassville’s new buses are just a few in the ever-growing fleet of electric school buses coming to districts across the Show-Me State. Most of the buses are purchased through grants or programs and lead to significant cost savings throughout the school year, school officials say.
Keith Dennis is president of the Beneficial Electrification League, a national organization that promotes the electrification of the economy. “Electric school buses represent a significant upgrade from conventional diesel-powered buses,” Keith says. “Not only do they not give off diesel fumes, they are cheaper to run and have fewer moving parts, which means less maintenance.”
Knox County R-1 School District in northeast Missouri was the first district in the state to embrace the electric buses. Students in an electrical class started talking about electric vehicles and Superintendent Andy Turgeon thought bigger. He partnered with Lewis County Rural Electric Cooperative to see if there was a way to deploy an electric bus into their fleet.
“We did a few years of research and decided that if we could get enough grants and partnerships to get the cost down to the price of a diesel we would entertain it,” Andy says. “Turns out we were able to get enough support that the first bus only cost us $7,000.”
Knox County’s first electric bus started transporting students to and from Edina in early 2021. Today, seven of the district’s 17 buses are electric. Andy says the stated range on each bus is about 125 miles. “But we’ve got drivers who have gotten really good using the regenerative braking by just easing off the pedal and putting energy back into the batteries,” he says. “I’ve got drivers who are probably hitting closer to 135 or 140 miles.”
They’ve had similar results in Cassville dispatching electric buses on routes through the hilly terrain in the southeast corner of the district near Table Rock Lake. “It’s a lot smoother ride on the hills too,” Jake says. “Instead of being pulled from an engine in the front that’s shifting, the weight is distributed more evenly and it’s just smoothly pushing you up the hill.”
Jake says the buses’ noise, or lack thereof, has improved the demeanor of the students inside. “It’s just a smoother, more comfortable ride for one,” he says. “But without the roar of the engine, they’re not having to raise their voices to have a conversation or to try and talk louder than the kids next to them. They just seem to be a little calmer in those buses.”
The buses are so quiet, they are designed to make sound when they are traveling less than 23 mph in Cassville and buses traveling less than 30 mph in Knox County play the school song as a safety feature so those around the bus know of its presence.
For both Cassville and Knox County, trading in the gas pump for a charging cord came with a few bumps early on, specifically with the charger. “Our first charger just wasn’t the adequate size,” Andy says. “Then that initial bus was a first-generation model and just had a few quirks, but the bus company and co-op have been great to work with.”
Having a charging strategy is an essential part of running electric buses. In Knox County, the buses are plugged in whenever they’re off the road. Throughout the day, they are programmed to take in about 10 amps of power, enough to keep the battery compartments at 72 degrees, helping extend the life of the batteries. Between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. — when less power is needed for the electric grid — the input is throttled up to 80 amps ensuring the buses will be fully charged in the morning. “In the winter, we can also program them to start preheating 20 minutes before the driver will leave for the route,” Andy says.
Keith says most buses on set routes — particularly those in rural areas where electric co-ops serve — will likely be electric in a few decades. “It is simply a better technology,” he says. “Student transportation is a huge line item in every school’s budget. If electric buses achieve purchase-price parity with diesel buses, which are also rising in cost, electric buses will become standard.”
All of Cassville’s electric buses and a majority of Knox County’s were purchased through EPA’s Clean Bus Program, which funded the buses up to $345,000 and the charging infrastructure. The program provides $5 billion over five fiscal years. In total, 26 mostly rural Missouri districts were awarded rebates for 57 electric buses in the first round of funding and recently, seven more urban Missouri school districts were awarded grants for 320 buses.
Cassville worked with nearby Barry Electric Cooperative before applying for the award and to dispatch enough electric infrastructure to where the buses would be charged.
Knox County tracks their savings online, comparing the cost to use their diesel to electric buses. As of January, Knox County was reporting 22.5 cents per mile for their electric buses and 61.7 cents per mile on diesel. That equates to a savings of 39.2 cents per mile not including maintenance such as oil changes. “I think any school district should look at it and see the benefits,” Andy says. “Obviously the terrain and conditions will play a role in what works. But, with the programs out there you’d be crazy not to take advantage of it if you can.”
For more information on Knox County’s electric buses, visit bit.ly/knoxbus. For more information on the Beneficial Electrification League and their electric bus resources, visit be-league.org/buses.