Revelstoke's first electric school bus will take over the Arrow Heights route starting next week. The bus is charged and the driver is trained—the bus needs a radio installed and final approval from the Dept. of Transportation before it's ready to go.

"It's got quite a bit of pep, for sure, I'm pretty happy with the pick up of it," said Sonya Cinelli, the one who will be driving the electric bus.

Sonya Cinelli said that learning to drive the electric bus was nerve wracking, but now she's as comfortable with it as a diesel bus. Photo by Meagan Deuling.

This bus looks the same as a diesel bus, but it doesn't have the diesel smell and the only noises are a little hum, and the chains dangling near the tires. The hum is a noise that the manufacturers put in, Cinelli said, otherwise it would be completely silent. She said there is a 20 litre fuel tank for diesel for the heaters.

When the school district asked the drivers in Revelstoke if anyone wanted to use an electric bus, Cinelli was the only one who stepped forward. Every driver, including casuals, were trained to drive the bus, said Bruce Tisdale, the secretary-treasurer for School District 19.

The training was "nerve wracking, to say the least," Cinelli said, but she's just as confident driving this bus than a normal one, "no problem."

These buses go for $395,000. Revelstoke's school district ended up paying $212,000 for it, because it got third party grants and help from the province, Tisdale said. Still, that's between $20,000 to $24,000 more than a diesel bus. But Tisdale says the operation and maintenance costs for an electric bus are 80 per cent lower than a diesel bus. Because of this, he expects the school board to break even on the cost of the bus in under three years.

There is a charger for the bus that was installed behind Revelstoke Secondary School, again paid for by grants, Tisdale said. They were having trouble charging the bus at first, Tisdale said, but it is working now.

One drawback of the electric bus is that batteries are stored down the middle interior of it, taking up cargo space. That means that it can't be used for field trips or to take students up to the ski hill, for example.

But Cinelli is still thrilled.

"The driveability is amazing, it's really smooth, very touchy on the brakes, very heavy as well."

With the help of the students on her route, she's already named the bus Electric Eleanor, EE for short.

Sonya Cinelli is School District 19's only electric bus driver. Photo by Meagan Deuling.

Click below to hear a radio story about the bus that aired on StokeFM: