What’s Next in State ESB Policy

There are myriad ways states can continue leading a clean ride for kids, including:

• Funding electric school buses through grants, rebates or vouchers; exploring aggregate purchasing that can signal manufacturers to scale production and reduce costs
• Financing electric school buses through loans and bonds, especially with green banks
• Directing utilities or their regulators to create electric school bus incentives, vehicle-to-grid programs and fleet advisory services; to establish electric school bus-specific rates; and to include electric school buses in their long-term and grid innovation plans
• Creating technical assistance programs to provide fleets guidance and deployment support
• Preparing the workforce for electric school buses, especially drivers and mechanics
• Making electric school buses increasingly sustainable by enacting policies to recycle batteries and minimize the impact of mining
• Educating the public and especially school districts on electric school buses, such as through case studies, publicly available data, workshops, ride-and-drive events, and demonstrations
• Updating approved vendors list and contracting terms to include electric school buses, or reducing barriers to electric school bus adoption (such as eliminating their sales tax)
• Setting transition goals for school bus fleets

Most of these opportunities are explored in greater detail in the AESB-WRI State Policy Playbook for Advancing School Bus Electrification.