(The Center Square) – Taxpayers are set to give the struggling electric bus industry a jolt after Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced nearly $20 million for 70 zero-emission buses at nine Illinois school districts.
On Thursday, Pritzker’s office announced the Illinois State Board of Education awarded a $19.9 million grant from the Clean Heavy-Duty Vehicles Grant Program funded by federal tax dollars as part of President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.
Troy Community Consolidated School District 30-C is set to get 32 school buses and charging infrastructure. Joliet Township High School District 204 and Zion-Benton Township High School District 126 will each get 10 school buses and charging infrastructure. Six other districts will also get at least one bus and charging infrastructure.
Each bus comes to about $284,000.
“[T]hese districts will receive electric school buses, charging infrastructure, and workforce training – reducing harmful emissions and improving air quality,” Pritzker said in a statement.
The grant also funds two full-time ISBE employees to support the program’s implementation and work with districts on other “green energy” initiatives.
Thursday’s announcement comes after Pritzker commented on the performance of electric bus manufacturer Lion Electric, which is in line to get state tax credits for operating a facility in Joliet.
“If they reach the goals that they’ve set with us, and there’s an agreement that gets set, hiring a certain number of people, fulfilling on a certain amount of investment, then they receive the benefit of those tax credits,” Pritzker said last week at an unrelated event. “But if they don’t, then they haven’t lived up to their part of the agreement, the state does not owe them anything. But look, I’m very disappointed in their progress.”
Pritzker laid the blame on President-elect Donald Trump for the sluggish EV market.
“There’s an awful lot of pressure that’s been put on electric vehicle companies as a result of Donald Trump’s rhetoric and promises that he’s made to kind of tear down the electric vehicle … industry development,” Pritzker said.
Whether Lion Electric would be the supplier of such buses as part of the $19.9 million program wasn’t clear. The Illinois State Board of Elections said each district will purchase the buses according to their own local procurement rules.
