Oakland’s busy port, truck traffic, and manufacturing facilities mean that Alameda County, where Oakland is located, has some of the worst air pollution in the US. and it greatly affects the city’s low-income families.

Now, wedged between a 10-lane freeway and a freight terminal, is a part of the solution – 74 electric school buses, the first all-electric bus fleet to serve a major US school district, which will supply the Bay Area power grid with enough renewable energy to power 300 to 400 homes while making the environment healthier, especially for children.

The buses will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by about 25,000 tons annually in Oakland. Its previous bus fleet ran on diesel, and the results were noticeable. “I would wipe my fingers along the inside of the bus at the end of the day and they would be black from diesel smoke,” says Marjorie Urbina, who has driven school buses for 23 years. “If it’s in the bus, it’s in my lungs.”