PCSS To Implement First Electric Buses During This School Year

Putnam County School System will be able to implement its two new electric buses into bus routes for this coming school year.

Transportation Supervisor Ron Chaffin said Putnam Schools is the first school district in the nation to actually receive the buses and use them from a grant federal grant opportunity. The Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean School Bus program invested $1 billion in school districts through a rebate program.

Chaffin said this is a huge opportunity for the school system.

“If we ever have a situation to where we are going to be all-electric or a part of our fleet going electric then were going to have a step ahead,” Chaffin said. “Because we’ve already had them on the road, we’ve already figured out how they work, to know where we can put them and to put them in with all of our buses to see how they perform.”

Chaffin said the buses will be different from regular buses because there will be no engine noise and no emissions. He said the system has been outfitted at no cost with charging equipment at the new school bus garage set to be built off Tennessee Avenue.

Chaffin said in addition to new buses, the transportation department is trying to add two to three more routes. He said that comes after they added seven routes the previous school year.

“We’re not going to be able to go door-to-door like we’d like to be able to do but by adding these routes we’re able to cut down the populations on the buses,” Chaffin said. “So hopefully the overcrowding on the buses is going to be less than we have had in the past.”

Chaffin said they have also added more monitors on the buses to help with discipline issues.