RALEIGH, (SGRToday.com) - North Carolina's Clean School Bus Program has received accolades from the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The 18-year program aims to improve air quality at the state's public schools.

 

The program has used a combination of policy, technology, outreach and transportation efforts to reduce students’ exposure to harmful air pollution from cars and school buses since the mid-1990s. 

 

A key goal of the program, according to the state, was to reduce air emissions from older school buses, which often are powered by diesel engines that can produce harmful emissions. Nearly 800,000 students travel on buses in 115 school systems across the state. State and local agencies have used nearly $3.6 million in grants to install pollution controls on older buses or replace them with new, cleaner models. 

 

State and local agencies used grants to help retrofit 1,854 buses with exhaust controls for removing harmful emissions at school systems across the state. The grants also helped replace or repower an additional 37 buses with cleaner-burning alternatives, such as hybrid gas-electric buses. DAQ estimates that these technological improvements have reduced annual bus emissions by 3.4 tons for nitrogen oxides and 9.1 tons for particle pollution.

 

State efforts to reduce unnecessary idling help to conserve fuel in addition to reducing air pollution. New and retrofitted buses often achieve better gas mileage in addition to cleaner emissions. DPI estimates that new school buses average about10 percent better fuel economy based on a comparison of 1,024 school buses meeting 2010 emissions standards compared with 1,756 similar buses/engines meeting 2007 emissions standards.