The U.S. Transportation Department said on Tuesday it is awarding $1.66 billion in grants to cities and states to buy 1,800 buses in a shift to cleaner, lower-emission travel.
The grants will fund 1,100 zero-emission buses, which will nearly double the existing 1,300 zero-emission transit buses, the White House said.
Buses account for about half of the 10 billion U.S. transit trips Americans took in 2019. But there are still few green buses - just 18% of the 72,000 U.S. transit buses were hybrid electric in 2020, accordingPublic transit suffered through COVID-19 as tens of millions of Americans worked from home and curbed business and tourism travel, but systems are reporting increasing use as Americans return to offices and travel.
to buy about 230 electric buses to replace older diesel ones, electrifying nearly 4% percent of its 5,800-bus fleet.