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fter Ralph Knight pioneered the use of electric school buses in Northern Cali- fornia in 1997, he remembers dealing with kids “stuck out along the edge of the road.” “Te best you could do was go out with a spare bus and get them home,” said Knight, an industry legend who retired as transportation director of Napa


Valley Unified Schools, where he replaced all of the district’s diesel buses with clean fuel options. “Any bus can break down, but when it’s four days a week, parents will be calling. My mechanics would have rather seen those things (being used) as anchors out there on big ships.” Tat is, at the bottom of the sea. A lot has changed since those days. Now, some districts across the country are looking to add electric school buses to their fleets, major OEM suppliers are rolling out electric buses, utilities are collaborating because of the bene- fits to the grid, and federal and state government incentives as well as funds from the Volkswagen Mitigation Trust Fund settlement are helping make the buses more affordable. And there should be fewer worries about buses being stranded along the side of the road.


Ralph Knight has seen alternative fuels come a long way since first introducing them into Napa Valley Unified School District two decades ago.


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