Photo: Courtesy of Zūm
Oakland, California is going electric with its school bus fleet, the first all-electric bus fleet to serve a major US school district. Starting in August, the 74 vehicles will drive students to and from school and deliver 2.1 gigawatt-hours of electricity to the Bay Area power grid, which is enough energy to power 300-400 homes. The charging schedule for the buses has been carefully laid out, allowing the buses to be charged when energy supply is high and allowing them to generate and return energy to the grid when supply is lower. “There is an excess of supply during the solar peak and this is a way we can move some of that energy from that time of the day to when we actually need it,” says Rudi Halbright, a product manager at California utility Pacific Gas and Electric Company. The new fleet also dramatically reduces air pollution and offers students a much quieter ride to school.
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