From the April - June 2022 Jersey Sierran
Transportation Committee Chair's Report
By Bill Beren, Beren1@verizon.net
Our Chapter’s Transportation Committee was instrumental in achieving some major victories in the fight to reduce the transportation sector’s carbon footprint.
Our campaign to electrify the state’s 22,000 school buses helped get legislation passed in both the Assembly and Senate, but time ran out to reconcile the differences in the two bills before the end of the legislative session on January 10. However, we are working with the two prime sponsors, Sen. Patrick Diegnan Jr. and Asm. Sterley S. Stanley, both Democrats from the 18th District, so that $15 million in annual funding is included in next fiscal year’s budget.
We are also happy to report that the first five electric school buses in the state were put into service by Student Transportation of America for students in the Trenton Public Schools. We are pleased to note that the NJ Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has incorporated the requirement that all electric vehicles funded by their grants include dataloggers and report performance statistics such as mileage between recharging to the DEP. This requirement was inserted into the pending legislation based on amendments proposed by the Transportation Committee. In 2022, the Committee will continue our educational outreach on electric school buses. We’ll be hosting webinars and conducting research needed to speed the adoption of electric school buses.
Included in last year’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act are additional funds for electric school buses (between $2.5 billion and $5 billion) that will be distributed later this year by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Guidelines and rules for this grant program will be published by the EPA sometime this spring. The bill also includes funding for the long-delayed Gateway tunnels that will serve NJ Transit and Amtrak passengers between New Jersey and New York City. Additional funds may be available to jump-start the extension of the Hudson Bergen Light Rail from North Bergen to Englewood.
In December, the DEP formally adopted the Advanced Clean Truck rule, which sets goals for the sale of electric delivery vehicles in the state starting in 2025 and continuing to 2050.
For more about the Advanced Clean Truck rule, visit https://bit.ly/3oVjsAs.