School bus driver Jenifer Chiodo takes a moment to admire the orange-pink sunrise while she gets ready to spend the next few hours on the roads. Then she grabs her clipboard and jots down the date, her name, and the mileage on the odometer before starting up the engine of a Thomas Built Type-A “mini” bus owned by her employer, First Student Inc.

Chiodo drives about 21 miles on her two morning routes and 40 miles on her four afternoon routes, transporting just one or two special-needs children at a time across the suburbs of Rocky Point, New York. A Type-A bus gets just nine to 10 miles per gallon, and Chiodo says she’s come to realize how unsustainable and unhealthy her driving can be.

“I don’t even want to think about how much carbon my bus spews out into the air every day and how it’s warming the atmosphere,” says Chiodo. “Kids are breathing in exhaust, I’m breathing in exhaust... I’m very happy to help get these students to school, but I wish there was a safer and more environmentally friendly way of doing so.”

Too much, magic bus

Turns out, there might be a better way—and it’s being tried out just 40 miles west in another Long Island town. Copiague Public School District bus drivers are test-driving an electric version of Chiodo’s Type A bus. This past August, the district quietly added the all-electric vehicle to its fleet of traditional fossil-fuel-powered school buses, becoming the first in the state to do so. The district says its choice to try electric aligns with its goals of sustainability and safety.

America’s school buses burn through an estimated 822,857,143 gallons of diesel and gasoline per year. All-electric school buses emit nothing when running, and they have the potential to significantly cut down on the nation’s fossil fuel use and thus its contribution to climate change. Proponents of electric-vehicle technology argue that traditional gasoline- and diesel-powered school buses are far from safe, spewing out toxic emissions while relying on a body design that puts them at a higher fire risk than other types of vehicles.

“Compare an electric battery that’s placed low in between the buses’ frame rails, out of the way of impact, to a 50-gallon tank of highly flammable material that’s sitting right under kids for the duration of the ride,” says Jim Castelaz, CEO of California-based Motiv Power Systems, a company that creates the electric power train on which electric school buses and other vehicles are based. “It’s crazy to think we’re doing this.”

According to the National Fire Protection Agency, an average of six buses—including school buses—caught on fire each day from 1999 to 2003, the most recent years for which data is available. Instead of gas tanks, electric buses have batteries. While some lithium batteries have notably caught fire, electric buses use batteries made with a sodium-nickel or lithium material that solidifies upon impact to prevent fires that could be caused by leaking acid.

Thruppence and sixpence every day

The human and environmental health benefits of electric school buses are clear. But electric school buses cost about $200,000 to $300,000 per bus, as opposed to a mere $65,000 to $85,000 for a bus powered by fossil fuels. For many school districts, the only concern appears to be cost-effectiveness.

Driving up the cost of electric school buses is the dearth of companies building them and the parts they need to function. Besides Motiv, only a handful of other big names in the electric school bus business exist in North America: Lion Bus, Green Power Motor Company, Inc., Trans Tech, and Trans Power.

What’s more, many school districts shut down some or all of their bus fleet on weekends and over the summer, in contrast to municipal buses used for public transportation, which often run all day, 365 days a year. So while going electric in high-use municipal buses offers some return on investment, electric school buses have not yet reached that point. They’re simply not used enough to offset their high costs, according to Fraser Atkinson, chairman of Green Power Motor Company, Inc.

But he suggests that this shouldn’t deter school districts from buying electric school buses, especially in cases where a particular bus or group of buses will get a lot of use. For example, school districts often utilize Type-A school buses more frequently than the long “classic” Type-C buses. Like Chiodo, their drivers often run multiple routes a day to transport just a few students at a time, such as special-needs students who may go to separate schools. When an electric bus is driven as many routes as possible, school districts reap a higher return on investment.

Although the finances are iffy, rebates, which lower the overall cost of purchasing electric school buses, are a major deciding factor in whether or not districts will adopt them. California and Quebec are seeing electric school bus popularity rise because local lawmakers have developed a suite of rebates, regulations, and infrastructure that’s made the technology more cost-effective.

I want it, I want it, I want it

Yet school districts in New York and Chicago, the latest regions to adopt rebates for electric school buses, have been slow to embrace them. This concerns environmental and health advocates who want to see gasoline- and diesel-powered school buses replaced as soon as possible. But transportation experts say the only way for electric school buses to see more widespread adoption is if school districts push for rebates.

“Electric school buses have the potential to reduce the harms of pollution to school children and communities while reducing the exposure to the volatile price of petroleum fuels that can wreak havoc on municipal budgets,” says Luke Tonachel, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s Clean Vehicles and Fuels Project. “School districts should seek to work with their local utility to create programs that can make electrifying their buses a cost-effective solution.”

Erica Cirino is a freelance science writer based in New York. She covers wildlife and the environment, and specializes in biology, conservation and policy.