Kamala Harris’s Beloved ‘Yellow School Buses’ Not Going Green as Quickly Biden Administration Promised

Kamala Harris’s Beloved ‘Yellow School Buses’ Not Going Green as Quickly Biden Administration Promised

In the fall of 2022, Vice President Kamala Harris touted $1 billion in grants for schools nationwide to purchase about 2,500 “clean” school buses under a new federal program.

As a reminder, it was the source of her immortal “yellow school bus” soliloquy:

In total, the funds will go towards 3,400 new school buses, the Biden administration said, 92% of which will be electric and the other 8% will be fueled by less pollutant propane or natural gas.

“When we send our kids off to school, we want to know they’re entering a healthy environment where they can learn. But for millions of kids that iconic yellow school bus that takes them to school is polluting their air with diesel exhaust contributing to asthma and other serious health conditions,” said White House deputy chief of staff Natalie Quillian on a press call previewing the announcement on Tuesday.

“Not only is this funding providing cleaner air, it’s also helping tackle climate change and creating good-paying union jobs in electric school bus manufacturing.”

Who remembers the animated childlike Kamala Harris talking about the yellow school bus?

our potential next Democrat presidential candidate and how much she loves the yellow school bus.

Who doesn't love a yellow school bus, right. Can you raise your hand if you love the… pic.twitter.com/YQJOrTqf57

— Andrea Shaffer, Employment/Labor Law (@Andreafreedom76) July 21, 2024

It appears that the “greener school bus” program has been as successful as Harris’s work as Border Czar.

Veep Kamala Harris touted federal grants two years ago to replace thousands of gas-guzzling school buses with greener versions — yet fewer than 7% of the initial districts have actually completed the switch.

The administration announced its kick-off to the troubled program in 2022, with Harris crowing that the first billion dollars would help 389 school districts across the country purchase upwards of 2,400 “clean” buses.

But so far, just 27 of those hundreds of school districts have marked their project status as “complete,” according to an EPA tracker, which was updated June 20.

…Funding for the project, called the “Clean School Bus’’ program, was included in a 2021 infrastructure bill that President Biden signed into law.

The move allocated a total of roughly $5 billion to be doled out to the districts over about five years.

Harris touted the first billion-dollar tranche of grants during an event in Seattle, Wash., in 2022.

“Who doesn’t love a yellow school bus, right?” she quipped at the time.

How many of those 2,400 eco-friendly buses have been built? Exactly 60, and 55 districts have already pulled out.

Collectively, those districts have deployed a total of 60 battery-electric or low-emissions propane-fueled school buses. And 55 additional districts have pulled out of the program, according to other federal data shared with the Free Beacon, citing a variety of technological and infrastructure concerns.

In other words: More school districts have withdrawn from the program than proven that they have completed it.

“EPA anticipates that transitioning to new technology school buses will take time, which is why the project period is two years with an option to extend where needed and justified,” said EPA spokeswoman Shayla Powell.

One has to wonder where the money went. Let’s say the first tranche ($1 billion) went to manufacture those 60 buses. That’s about $17 million per bus, which should make them sweet rides, indeed.

This spring, reports about breakdowns and recalls associated with electric school buses had opponents raising new questions about whether the existing timetable for adopting them is realistic.

Traditional diesel buses, for instance, have a failure rate of 1 or 2 percent, meaning that out of a fleet of 100 buses, one or two would be down for repairs on a given day, said David Christopher, executive director of the state Association for Pupil Transportation, which represents school bus directors.

For electric buses, the failure rate is about 20 percent, meaning 20 of 100 e-buses are down on any given day, due to problems with the buses or with their charging devices.

“They’ve been around for a long time,” Christopher said of diesel buses and if something goes wrong. “It’s typically an easy fix.”

American automakers are beginning to reconsider the overly ambitious plans Biden-Harris has touted for electrifying the nation’s cars. Clearly, green energy realities are not living up to the hype.

Let’s hope school administrators figure this out before wasting resources and effort. Diesel fuel costs about $3.70 per gallon. The cost of one of these green buses would purchase about 4 million gallons of diesel fuel, which would allow many kids to get to school on time and safely.

Meanwhile, check out the video. The comments are gold.

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