There was a lot of activity related to clean transportation in New Jersey in the first quarter of 2026.
Electric School Buses
Peg Hanna, director of climate change mitigation and monitoring for the NJ Department of Environmental Protection, has announced that she is retiring after a 35-year career with the DEP. She has been a staunch advocate for electrifying New Jersey’s school bus fleet for the past seven years, starting with the first grant program using the Volkswagen settlement money in 2018. For years, Sierra Club has had a very close and productive working relationship with Peg as we advocated for school bus electrification. Peg was featured in our first school bus video “Electric School Buses Are the Future,” which can be seen on our website. We will miss her and look forward to continuing our work with Melissa Evanego, who is expected to be the new head for vehicle electrification.
Melissa’s responsibilities will include the oversight of the remaining two years of the NJ Electric School Bus Grant Program. A priority for the Club will be drafting and lobbying for a bill to extend the program for another three years. Oregon and Minnesota have pioneered a unique tax of 25-50 cents on home deliveries by companies such as Amazon to fund vehicle electrification grants. Given the tight budget facing New Jersey, this could be a fairly painless option for our state to adopt.
The federal Clean School Bus Program is expected to begin accepting new grant applications this summer after a one-year hiatus—the Trump Administration is attempting to redirect the grant money away from electric battery buses toward buses powered by such fuels as compressed natural gas, propane, hydrogen, and biomass, which generally have lower emissions than diesel but are not as clean as all-electric.
It is not clear if school districts will be interested in applying for grants to purchase buses that will run on these alternate fuels. For instance, First Student, the largest provider of school bus transportation in the country, wrote to the Environmental Protection Agency that they will continue to request funding for electric school buses, given the costs and safety concerns with propane and compressed natural gas (CNG).
Problems cited by First Student with propane include the fact that it is 1) 33% less efficient than diesel, 2) propane buses need to be emptied of propane before they can be maintained in indoor garages, and 3) Occupational Safety and Health Administration records show that severe injuries and sometimes death can occur during these fuel transfers. They also claimed that infrastructure costs for propane and CNG can equal the costs of electrical charging infrastructure. In addition, these alternate fuels are still fossil-fuel based and continue to emit greenhouse gases, further contributing to climate change.
Another barrier to using alternate fuels is that the big four school bus manufacturers do not produce buses designed to run on these fuels, with the exception that Blue Bird makes propane-powered buses.
Vehicle Electrification
Our Chapter is working with legislators to implement our recommendation to replace the current punitive registration fees assessed on EVs with a per kWh tax on EV charging that would act very much like the current gas tax. For more information, please refer to the report we wrote on this topic.
New Brunswick-based warehousing and distribution trucking company Herman Total Distribution Service, took delivery of 15 electric tractor trailers last October. In March, the company was awarded another $3 million grant to purchase additional electric semi cabs, further expanding the largest electric fleet of tractor trailers in New Jersey. This is an important milestone in the transition to sustainable warehouse operations, which hopefully will serve as an example for other large logistics companies.
NJ Turnpike Expansion Downsized
Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s administration has scaled back the size of the new Turnpike Bridge over Newark Bay from four lanes in each direction to two, in keeping with the carrying capacity of the existing bridge. The Sierra Club supported the need to replace the existing Casciano Bridge because of its age and similarity to Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, which collapsed in 2024 when it was hit by a freighter that lost power. As part of the new plan, the governor has announced that work will also begin on a redesign of the Turnpike terminus leading into the Holland Tunnel.
NJ Transit Subsidies
Gov. Sherrill’s budget proposal included a 26% increase in operating subsidies for NJ Transit, bringing the annual allocation for NJ Transit to over $1 billion. This increase is partly supported by newly dedicated revenue from the Corporate Transit Fee imposed during Gov. Phil Murphy’s final term in office. The additional funds will cover an expected 11% increase in operating costs for the agency while the budget assumes that revenue from bus and rail fares will remain flat.
In February, NJ Transit announced the reintroduction of its popular FlexPass: 20 one-way tickets between specific rail stations or bus stops for a 15% discount. This option had been halted in 2024 as part of the agency’s cost-cutting efforts and fare hikes but was popular with commuters who did not commute five days a week. FlexPass tickets must be purchased using the NJ Transit mobile app, are valid for 30 days from the date of purchase, and are non-refundable.
Resources
Electric School Buses: https://shorturl.at/CJich
EV fees: https://shorturl.at/EkaVY
Herman Grant: https://shorturl.at/WriwK