GreenPower Motor Company Inc. has announced the signing of a new contract with the state of New Mexico to implement an all-electric school bus pilot project following an award made by the RFP, which was first published in May.
The two-year pilot will see the deployment of three GreenPower Type A zero-emission Nano BEAST Access school buses within the first school year (2025-26), and three GreenPower Type D all-electric BEAST and Mega BEAST school buses during the second school year (2026-27).
Each school bus will rotate around the state in a set of five pilot rounds during each school year, with each round lasting six weeks.
GreenPower will install charging systems, provide driver training, mechanics and the community’s first responder in order to ensure a seamless testing period.
The contract between GreenPower and New Mexico is valued at just over 5 million USD and includes the purchase of vehicles, the cost of charging infrastructure and overall management of the pilot itself.
School districts are now being selected by the state to participate in the pilot, with the manufacturing of the three Nano BEAST Access school buses now substantially complete and ready for deployment on the first week of the pilot from 15 September.
GreenPower President Brendan Riley, said:The New Mexico pilot project provides an opportunity to expand the reach of GreenPower’s zero-emission school bus product and gives parents, kids and school districts in the state the opportunity to evaluate the transition to all-electric, purpose-built school buses.
The project is leveraging the successful pilot that GreenPower conducted in West Virginia, but also has a concentration on evaluating charging options and infrastructure.
GreenPower will partner with Highland Electric Fleets to install and implement the pilot’s charging infrastructure, which will include both Level 3 DC fast chargers and Level 2 slow chargers for the Nano BEAST Access school buses, as well as an evaluation of Level 3 DC fast charging in the second year with the BEAST school buses.
The second year of the pilot will also see the evaluation of a vehicle-to-grid (V2G) utilising the GreenPower Mega BEAST, a 40-foot Type D all-electric school bus that offers a range of up to 300 miles on a single charge with a 387 kWh battery pacl.
Mark Roper, Director of the Economic Development Division within the New Mexico Economic Development Department, said:We are particularly interested in evaluating charging as a part of the pilot project.
Range, charging rates and grid resiliency are critical components of switching to all-electric, zero-emission vehicles.
