June 3, 2024 By Carol Britton Meyer
The Town of Hingham was recently awarded $600,000 in federal funding under the Clean School Bus program from a total of $42 million among 17 Massachusetts school districts.
“The program enables school districts to replace fossil-fueled school buses with cleaner electric models, helping communities reduce climate pollution and the resulting health risks for children,” Gov. Maura Healey said in a May 31 press release.
Massachusetts has also supported municipal school bus fleet conversions through the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, helping municipalities across the state with grant and technical assistance through various programs.
School Committee Chair Nes Correnti called this “very exciting news.”
Executive Director of Business & Support Services Aisha Oppong is working with the Hingham Public Schools’ vendor, Dattco, to get the electric buses. “We have one year to use the funds,” Correnti said. “We will have more information [to share] in the coming weeks.”
“On first glance, electric school buses are significantly more expensive than their diesel counterparts. On average, the contracted price for an electric buses is almost $352,000—about three and a half times the price of diesel buses, which cost less than $100,000 on average. (article from Apr 22, 2024)”
“Each electric bus could save districts nearly $2,000 a year in fuel and $4,400 a year in maintenance costs, totaling tens of thousands of dollars over the lifetime of a bus. (article from Oct 18, 2023)”
Math doesn’t add up.
Not factored in is the cost for the charging station and the annual electric costs.