Proterra lands first airport customer for its electric buses

Proterra, a Greenville developer and manufacturer of heavy-duty electric buses, has landed its first airport customer.

The company announced Friday that the Raleigh-Durham, N.C., Airport will buy four of its long-range electric buses and related charging infrastructure. Proterra, based in California, has its primary production facility in Greenville.

"Bringing zero-emission buses to airports throughout North America is an integral part of Proterra's next stage of growth, and we couldn't be happier to announce RDU as our first airport customer," Ryan Popple, CEO of Proterra, said in the release.

The North Carolina airport (RDU), which served 11 million passengers last year, cited Proterra's sustainability, performance and operational cost savings (about 68 cents cheaper per mile than diesel) in making the purchase, according to a news release from Proterra.

Currently, RDU uses a fleet of 14 diesel shuttle buses to move about 112,000 passengers a month between the airport's two ParkRDU Economy lots and terminals. The airport replaces these 40-foot shuttle buses about every decade.

RDU's four zero-emission electric buses, branded under "Proterra Catalyst E2," will replace four older diesel buses, eliminating 16.9 million pounds of greenhouse gases over the lifetime of those vehicles. 

A Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) grant of $1.6 million will help pay for the purchase. The FAA announced Aug. 14 that it would award a total $162.4 million in airport infrastructure grants to 72 airports in 31 states across the United States as part of its Airport Improvement Program (AIP), according to a news release from the agency. All airports are entitled to some funding annually but some is also set aside for discretionary grants.

Raleigh-Durham's bus money came out of the AIP's discretionary grants.

Donaldson Field in Greenville also received AIP discretionary money this year -- $5.1 million to repair a taxiway.