In late April, a New York Times article titled “In Two-Way Charging, Electric Cars Begin to Earn Money From the Grid” caught the attention of task force members aligned with the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) who are currently exploring how to expand “electrified” school buses nationwide.
Two transportation directors that attended recent CGI School Bus Project meetings told STN they were invited because of their respective experience with the eTrans fully electric school bus by Type-A body manufacturer Trans Tech Bus.
John Clements, who recently retired as transportation director at Kings Canyon Unified, located in California’s Central Valley, attended the May 7 meeting held at the South Coast Air Quality Management District. Considered one of the alternative-fuel pioneers in the school bus industry, Clements left behind a fleet of vehicles powered by clean diesel, CNG and electricity, with several charge-sustaining hybrids and the eTrans. The district’s alt-fuel fleet is shown above.
Other meeting attendees included Joe Angeli from Creative Bus, G.P. Singh from National Express, Shyam Nagrani of Motiv Power Systems, Kevin Matthews of NSI Consulting and Stella K. Li, president of BYD Motors Inc. A Chinese electric-car and battery manufacturer, BYD opened an electric-bus assembly facility in Lancaster, Calif., on May 1.
Clements said the CGI folks are looking to assist school districts and school bus contractors in obtaining electric school buses that could be plugged into the power grid to stabilize the frequency. At the same time, he explained, grid operators could draw small amounts of power from the buses when they are not being used. The grid operates at 60 Hertz, and there are times when the power will spike yet other times drop dramatically.
“The goal is to have reliable source of battery-operated school buses that would help the grid operators maintain and regulate the frequency of the grid. They need to take small hits of power, so it’s not going to deplete bus batteries,” Clements continued. “They are still exploring, but they’re further along than what I expected.”
He added that CGI representatives are proposing a fee structure by which they would pay school districts to assist in purchasing the buses and maintaining them, while also paying an annual fee to have those buses available to serve the grid — and thus the community.
“The benefits to this type of partnership would be twofold: The utility customers get a benefit by having reliability of service. Today we take for granted that when we flip the switch, we have a continuous source of electricity,” said Clements. “The bottom line is if I can put electricity in a bus for $20 a day or less, and then I’m supplemented by a foundation [grant] or offering from grid folks, you’re going a long way toward reducing my expenses and operating costs.”
He noted that CGI aims to be at the forefront of this movement as it works toward implementing a demonstration program in the near future. At the meeting, CGI representatives also asked about how the electrified school bus project would improve air quality in regions with more electrified buses in use.
“To think we could work with CGI and develop a secondary funding source and use these batteries to buffer or stabilize grid frequency, and also have an income source to assist public school districts in operating and maintaining these, this has value for our industry,” Clements remarked.
Wayne Johnston, transportation director at the Springfield Township (Pa.) School District attended the April 25 task force meeting after returning from a trip to China, where he saw firsthand how widespread usage of electrified vehicles would look. He clarified that the term “electrified” is preferred because there are companies working on retrofitting vehicles, so the bus is not electric but electrified.
Years ago, Johnston worked with Proterra on building electric-bus prototypes. While Proterra initially wanted into the school bus market, he said, the buses are only used in transit because transit agencies get federal funding, so it is much more lucrative for them. Now, with help from the Clinton Foundation, electrified school buses could be more widely adopted for student transportation.
The focus of the April 25 meeting, he continued, was the electrification of the school bus industry and how to get it “jump-started.” There was also discussion about how to get school superintendents and school boards on board with trying out electrified school buses.
“We who are in the trenches understand this is worth investing in, but it’s our supervisors that need to understand. While it is a huge monetary investment, the more people buy (electric), the less it costs,” Johnston said. “Still, most superintendents’ mentality is: This is nothing we have to worry about.”
Yet Johnston stressed that the CGI project would address the funding question by offering grants to school districts that would cover the majority of the electric bus purchase.
“This is an unheard-of philosophy to plug in a bus and make money off it,” he added.
