Today in America, diesel school buses are emitting toxins that are directly harming our environment and our health. About 90 percent of school busses run on diesel fuel, which emits more than 3,000 tons of carcinogenic soot alongside 95,000 tons of pollutive compounds each year. Every day, children are breathing in harmful toxins, such as nitrogen oxides, carbon dioxide, and sulfur oxides just from standing near the school bus. These harmful substances contribute to the production of ground-level ozone, which damages crops, trees and other vegetation. In fact, tailpipe emissions from cars, trucks and buses account for over one-fifth of the United States' total global warming pollution.
Electric school buses are healthier, cleaner, and more economical than diesel school buses over an extended period of time. Electric school buses have no exhaust emissions, zero toxins, and zero carcinogens. In fact, over a 20 year period, it is estimated that electric buses save over $120,000 in fuel and maintenance costs, easily outperforming that of a standard diesel combustion bus.
With help from Northwestern students, the nationwide Head Start early childhood education program will buy its first electric school vehicles and charging infrastructure in Evanston. As a consequence of a proposal created by student sustainability fellows, Compass Transportation, which offers local transit to the Evanston program, was awarded a portion of a $4.2 million grant from Gov. J.B. Pritzker's Driving a Cleaner Illinois Program.
The Head Start program, run by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, promotes school readiness for young children from low-income families. This is the first time in the nation that the program is being served by an electric bus; this could have a significant positive impact on the health of communities that are more exposed to air pollution. Also, school buses are a tremendous source of untapped energy because they are only used for about 10% of the year. The local power grid's dependability, which is considered to be one of the major problems for the country's electric infrastructure, could be improved by using extra energy produced by electric school buses. So essentially, it's a win win situation for this community, and it could be for yours too.
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