On Friday, July 18th, Virginia Clean Cities hosted the Technology Happy Hour with Sonny Merryman, a successful deployer of electric school buses (ESBs). Whitney Kopanko, Director of Marketing and School Bus Sales, provided considerations for school districts looking to acquire electric school buses. 

Some highlights of her presentation include:

• Sonny Merryman has distributed over 220 Jouley Electric School buses to over 40 school districts since 2020! 
• Kopanko combatted common electrification fears, like upfront costs of EV supply equipment, with the concept of ...

The Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) is now hosting a National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Program Partnering List where potential site hosts and vendors can share information. This free listing will allow for direct coordination between potential site hosts, electricians, hardware providers, operators and more. 

To provide your company or site contact information, please visit the EV Resources ...

The US Joint Office of Energy and Transportation (Joint Office) added four new modules today on the topic of electric vehicle (EV) planning and the construction of zero-emission infrastructure. With these four new modules, the Joint Office doubles the size of their current Public EV Charging Infrastructure Playbook. The Public EV Charging Infrastructure Playbook was ...

Newport News Public Schools is an urban Virginia school district that educates approximately 26,500 students in 41 schools. The district transports around 24,000 students via 202 bus routes on which buses are required to navigate tight city roads and heavy stop-and-go traffic.

The district operates 317 total school buses; 153 of them are propane ...

Written by Sable Alonso

Electric vehicle charging is an important task that requires some planning. EVs don’t need to be charging all of the time, but it is wise to prepare for situations or trips ahead of time, especially when there is a risk of a hurricane in the area or other severe weather phenomenons. It’s good practice to ...

Mid-Atlantic Electrification Partnership (MAEP) EV-charging host site and general store owner, Jon Henry, has been elected as one of three finalists in a national award. The 2024 National Rural Grocery Summit’s Rural Grocer of the Year Award is run by the Rural Grocery Initiative and aims to support grocery stores outside of urban areas.

Jon Henry’s General Store is a ...

At the July 18th, 2024 VCC Board of Directors meeting, the Board elected new leadership roles for the coming year. The Board and VCC staff would like to sincerely thank outgoing board chair Nell Boyle for her excellent leadership and service.

Whitney Kopanko

Chair

Whitney is Director of Marketing and EV Program ...

$65 million is available for Innovations to Manage Growing Building, Transportation, and Industrial Loads on the Electric Grid. Connected Communities 2.0 is a funding opportunity announcement (FOA) that seeks to validate grid-edge technology innovations in real-world situations and provide new tools for utilities, grid planners and operators, automakers and smart charge management service providers, and ...

On July 22, The EPA announced 25 recipients for funds awarded through the Climate Pollution Reduction Grants (CPRG) Program. This Program is established through the Inflation Reduction Act, and selected applicants are receiving over $4.3 billion in total to “implement community-driven solutions to the climate crisis, reduce air pollution, advance environmental justice, and ...

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has announced that $1.7 billion will be given across Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland and Virginia to support the conversion of 11 shuttered or at-risk auto manufacturing and assembly facilities. The conversion will reprogram these facilities to manufacture electric vehicles and ...