3 Utah school districts awarded $1.49M to purchase clean school buses

The Park City School District and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday unveiled two new electric school buses that will be joining the district’s fleet.

The district is one of three in the state of Utah to receive a pair of electric buses, joining Granite School District and Uintah School District.

Officially awarded to the districts in May, the buses were provided through the EPA's Clean School Bus Program rebate competition that granted $1.49 million in rebates to the districts to purchase clean school buses as part of the Biden administration's Investing in America agenda.

Mike Tanner, chief operating officer of the Park City School District, said the district has been working for a few years to receive funding from the EPA to start electrifying its fleet.

"In Park City, in particular, we have a very environmental ethos here in town and we've been working in that direction with our facilities that we just recently built, making them more environmentally sustainable. And here within Park City, it's just where we've always intended to go. It was just that the funding mechanism didn't work out and now it finally did," Tanner said.

Park City School District and Granite School District each received $400,000 in rebate funding to purchase the buses, while Uintah School District was awarded $690,000.

"President Biden believes every child deserves the opportunity to lead a healthy life and breathe clean air, and his Investing in America agenda is designed to deliver just that," EPA administrator Michael S. Regan said in a statement when the awards were announced. "With today's latest round of funding, we are transforming the nation's school bus fleet to better protect our most precious cargo — our kids — saving school districts money, improving air quality, and bolstering American manufacturing all at the same time."

In 2022, Tintic School District and Uintah School District were awarded $4.74 million to electrify their respective bus fleets through the same rebate program.

Tintic received $790,000 for two buses and Uintah received $3,950,000 for 10 buses.

In total, the Uintah School District has been granted $4.64 million through the program, adding 12 electric buses in the process.

"Our decision to apply for this funding was based, in part, on a letter the district received earlier this year from the Utah Petroleum Association encouraging us to electrify our fleet and look for other ways to reduce emissions and improve air quality in the Uintah Basin," said Rick Woodford, Uintah School District superintendent, when the district was awarded its first chunk of money.

Woodford added that the district’s addition of the buses is saving local taxpayers more than $1 million over the next three years “that would have otherwise gone to purchase route buses on our regular replacement schedule.”