By Dana Kuhnline
June 22, 2023
This Week ReImagine Appalachia released Electrifying Transit, a new paper that highlights one of the unique opportunities from the federal climate infrastructure package – greening buses and creating jobs, all while increasing the health and wealth of our communities.
There’s a lot of talk about the transition to electric vehicles, but the discussion has largely focused on electrification of passenger vehicles.
We saw the need to hone in on needs related to expanding and electrifying public transportation in Appalachia and new federal opportunities for communities to help cover upfront costs to electrifying public transportation and school buses.
We are so excited to reveal the findings of this exciting new paper.
A few big takeaways:
Public transportation isn’t just buses in Appalachia
While public transit is often equated with 40-passenger buses and underground subways, the typical vehicle fleet in Appalachia includes a range of vehicles, from buses to airport shuttle-style vehicles to minivans and even sedans.
Of the 5,000+ transit vehicles in the Ohio River Valley of Appalachia, one third are buses, a third are shuttles, and a third are light-duty vehicles.
We can’t forget about school buses
The Ohio River Valley region has more than 20,000 school buses in operation.
Upgrading to an electric fleet won’t be cheap
A bus is not like your car. Plugging a fleet of buses, shuttles and light-duty vehicles into our electrical grid will require reinforcement of the electrical grid.
The paper estimates 100% electrification of public transit systems in the Appalachian portion of Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Pennsylvania would cost roughly $317 million annually over an ambitious 12-year period. That sum would include 1) roughly $175 million for purchasing the vehicles, and 2) some $140 million for upgrading existing facilities–amounting to $3.9 billion in total. Additionally, school bus electrification in the region would cost roughly $10 billion.
But it could pay for itself in just four years
A study from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates the average payback period for the increased purchase price of a battery electric bus fleet, over the cost of diesel buses, to be less than four years. Because electricity is cheaper than diesel, and electric buses require less maintenance, electric buses have lower annual operating costs than their diesel counterparts.
Moreover, since significant portions of the cost of purchasing the new bus and upgrading the grid could be funded by the federal government, while the day to day operations of the fleet are covered by the local community, electrification should allow local governments and school districts to save money even sooner.
And that’s not counting the public health and climate benefits
Toxic tailpipe emissions from diesel buses are associated with asthma and other chronic conditions, especially in children. Electric vehicles eliminate tailpipe emissions. Enhanced mobility and affordable transportation options are also good for public health.
Moreover, the transportation sector accounts for more than one-fourth of all carbon emissions in the Ohio River Valley of Appalachia. Curbing climate change will help the region reduce flooding, which can damage crops, contaminate public water supplies with bacteria, and attract increasing numbers of mosquitoes and ticks that carry disease.
Are you as excited about the possibilities as we are?
The paper discusses practical strategies for how the federal government can help empower local communities to take advantage of new funding opportunities and support collaboration across rural communities to maximize the impacts of these investments.
The paper also covers the need to map the skills of existing transit workers to ensure they are prepared for changes to the workforce that an electrified public transit system will bring.
We recognize that electrifying public transportation is only one piece of the larger puzzle of creating a complete system of affordable, equitable and sustainable transportation options that improve access and increase ridership. We have a lot of work to do to improve existing transportation infrastructure. It is important to understand that we, both as a nation and as a region, have significantly underinvested in alternative modes of transportation for nearly a century. The time has come to change that.
If done well, upgrades to our region’s transportation system will deliver greater economic, social, environmental, and health benefits that more than recoup the significant upfront investment required.
ReImagine Appalachia envisions a sustainable economic future for a 21st century Appalachia — one that is good for working people, communities, the land, and public health. One of the key parts of the blueprint for a re-imagined Appalachia is upgrading the region’s electrical infrastructure and building out a more sustainable transportation system.
We’re so excited to share this new paper with you – and to help grow this work in our region.
