Areli Sanchez’s daughter, Aida, was one of 20 million American children who rode a diesel bus to school every day.
Aida has asthma. When she was little, she complained about the smell and cloud of vapor during her twice-daily journey.
“When she came home from school or was on the bus, she would get a headache and an upset stomach. She said, ‘Mami, I don’t feel well, I feel dizzy,’” Sanchez said in Spanish from Las Vegas. Aida missed a lot of classes when her asthma was bad. Research shows that exposure to diesel exhaust can cause students to miss school and impact learning.
She was hospitalized in second grade for an asthma attack, and afterward Sanchez began driving Aida to school.
Diesel emissions from school buses may affect a third of U.S. students, their parents and teachers every day, according to federal data. It is a known carcinogen and contains harmful nitrogen oxides, volatile gases and particles that worsen lung problems. It also contributes to global warming.
Most affected by these environmental and health issues are Black, Latino, Indigenous and lower-income communities, who often rely on buses to get to school and also suffer from asthma at higher rates than other students. Some of the biggest drivers for change are parents concerned about their children.
Things continued to deteriorate for Areli Sanchez’s family in Las Vegas.
She felt like she had to stop working. “I didn’t know when we would get another call from school about another asthma attack,” she said.
A few years after her daughter started having problems, Sanchez saw the opportunity to get involved in the emerging electric bus movement. They don’t smell. They are not noisy. They cost more upfront, but cost less to run and can significantly reduce emissions, making them a solution to climate change.
Now, Sanchez has been advocating locally and beyond for four years, even taking a long diesel bus ride to the state capital, Carson City, to advocate for legislative funding.
Recently, she started to gain some traction when the Clark County School District, her district, began trading some of its buses for electric buses. These are still just a fraction of the nearly 2,000 in the fleet, but she is optimistic.
Similar progress is happening across the country as a sense of urgency arises around deteriorating air quality and environmental injustice linked to the warming climate.
Children are generally more harmed by air pollution than adults because their bodies are still developing and because they breathe more air per body size than adults, said Sara Adar, a University of Michigan epidemiology and public health researcher who linked the studies between health and health. school buses.
“As they burn their fuel and as the engine runs, they often release very, very small particles that can penetrate deep into our lungs and cause damage throughout the body,” Adar said.
Children can also spend a lot of time on stationary buses, she noted, increasing their exposure to something that could permanently harm their health. Research has also revealed poor air quality in older diesel school buses.
“It’s this ongoing cycle of poor air quality,” said Lonnie Portis, policy and advocacy manager for the activist group We Act for Environmental Justice in New York City. In hard-hit neighborhoods, he said, “you can at least take some of that away by putting electric school buses in the rotation.”
Some school districts have switched to newer versions of diesel buses, which are more efficient and produce less pollution, as a way to reduce student exposure. Others, especially in underfunded districts, are keeping their older, more polluting vehicles.
Like Sanchez, Liz Hurtado, the mother of four bus-riding children in Virginia Beach, Virginia, has advocated for electric buses for years.
Her eldest daughter also got headaches while riding in a diesel bus, and she would take her to school if she could, she said.
Hurtado is now national field manager for the grassroots group Moms Clean Air Force and active in a program aimed at protecting the health of Latino children. He is calling on school districts to buy electric buses. She plans events for community members to see and drive electric vehicles, hosts webinars and meetings, and teaches others how to connect with lawmakers.
“Knowing all the stressors and fears that climate change brings, and the fact that this is a huge burden on our children,” Hurtado said. “That puts a burden on us, right?”
Although an electric bus isn’t available to her yet, she still feels “very excited about the momentum.”
Federal money is now the main source of funding for electric school buses and is prioritizing low-income, rural and tribal communities, which advocates see as a huge win. According to WRI, most of the electric school buses currently on the road have landed in those areas.
“It means we’re bringing the solution closest to the problem,” said Carolina Chacon, coalition manager of the Alliance for Electric School Buses, a growing group of nonprofits.
Sanchez said Aida may not benefit from the electric buses since she is now 16.
“But other moms don’t have to worry like I did about the fumes,” she said.
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Alexa St. John is an Associated Press climate solutions reporter. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter, @alexa_stjohn. Reach her at [email protected].
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