Interesting read in last Sunday’s paper (“Why officials say electric school buses are the future,” Jan. 26). I have several points to make.

While “officials” make claims about air around the buses and the environment in general, they do not make any factual claims about benefits to the global warming target: CO2. The officials are basking in the largesse of the federal government, deep-state effort to reengineer our culture to adopt electric vehicles, no matter their real value.

Life cycle analysis was not mentioned. While I doubt one has been done for buses, there are several about autos. One conclusion is that a battery EV auto needs to be driven 82,000 miles before its carbon footprint begins to become less than that of a gas engine (source: Transportation Energy Institute). I think we can comfortably assume a similar situation for buses, largely because the grid is only 38% green, (wind, solar, hydro, nuclear).

Electric buses are only a possibility because the federal government is paying for most of them, while the debt is $36 trillion. This is an example of government overreach. It is ridiculous. The Maine Legislature has mandated that buses be electric by 2035. What the hell, add another $1 trillion to the debt for no good reason.

Brian Jones
Gorham