CA Agency May Scrap Electric Bus Fleet

CA Agency May Scrap Electric Bus Fleet After Electric Buses Melt in California Sun, Catch Fire, Cost Too Much to Fix
By Cristina Laila
Published July 23, 2021 at 12:00pm

The electric bus idea is going down in flames – literally.

A California transit official said electric buses manufactured by Proterra are melting in the California heat.

One electric bus caught fire while it was charging and the agency said the electric buses are just too expensive to fix.

The Washington Free Beacon reported:

An electric bus manufactured by Proterra caught fire while charging in a southern California city that is now considering taking the electric buses off the road, according to government records.

The Foothill Transit agency, which serves the valleys surrounding Los Angeles, will decide on Friday whether costly Proterra buses purchased in the last decade are still operable. Problems cited by the agency include not only the bus that caught fire in what’s described as a “thermal event,” but also buses that melt in the California heat and have transmission failures. Roland Cordero, the agency’s director of maintenance and vehicle technology, says the problems with the buses are exacerbated by Proterra’s inability to help with repairs.

“With the number of failures we are experiencing and the inability of Proterra to provide parts, these [Battery Electric Buses] BEBs will only get worse as we continue to operate them whenever the BEBs are available for service,” Cordero wrote ahead of Friday’s executive board meeting, where the agency will debate taking Proterra buses out of service.

Meanwhile Biden’s gargantuan ‘infrastructure’ plan allocates billions of dollars to expand electric vehicles and charging stations.