NFI Group, a leading independent bus and coach manufacturer and a leader in zero-emission electric mass mobility solutions, subsidiary New Flyer, announced that it has been named the partner of choice in over 338 million dollars of competitive grant awards through the Federal Transit Administration’s (FTA’s) 2024 Low- or No-Emission (Low-No) and Buses and Bus Facilities (BBF) programs.
The award amount was spread across 14 transit agency partners.
The FTA Low-No grant program was launched in 2015, with the first awards being dispersed in 2016.
In combination with the BBF program, the Low-No grant program aims to improve U.S. transit infrastructure while enabling agencies to reduce their environmental impact through the deployment of low- or zero-emission buses.
The awards for this year totaled almost 1.5 billion dollars and were spread across 117 projects in 47 states.
The total was divided between more than 1.1 billion dollars in Low-No awards and more than 390 million dollars in BBF awards and is expected to fund approximately 1,150 buses along with facilities, workforce development programs, and other systems to support them.
The United States Department of Transportation (USDOT), through its agency the FTA, used this year’s award cycle to continue efforts to help strengthen U.S. bus manufacturing by prioritizing proposals that included healthy contracting provisions such as using progress or advance payment plans and reducing customization by using either a joint procurement process or purchasing a standard bus model.
The 338 million dollars total represents agencies who directly partnered with New Flyer as part of their grant application.
The FTA has also awarded grants to agencies who did not specify a named partner and instead will use a procurement process to determine the manufacturer. The funds will remain available for use until FY2027.
“This year’s Low-No grant cycle affirmed two things: USDOT’s support of resilient, domestic clean bus manufacturing with a healthier contracting environment, and our customers’ confidence in the value of owning a New Flyer bus,” says Jennifer McNeill, Vice President, Public Sector Sales & Marketing, New Flyer and MCI.
“US public agencies have used Low-No Grants to procure NFI buses and charging infrastructure for nine consecutive years, every year since the grant was originally awarded,” she adds.
After partnering with grantees receiving nearly $200 million in 2022 and more than $207 million in 2023, New Flyer’s partners delivered their strongest grant approval performance for the third year in a row, with 2024’s awards outpacing the previous year by more than $120 million.”
NFI is a leader in zero-emission mobility, with electric vehicles operating (or on order) in more than 150 cities in six countries.
The firm offers the widest range of zero-emission battery and fuel cell-electric buses and coaches, and its vehicles have completed over 195 million EV service miles.
Today, NFI supports growing North American cities with scalable, clean, and sustainable mobility solutions through its mobility solution ecosystem, which includes buses and coaches; infrastructure; parts and service; technology; workforce development and training; and vehicle financing.
The firm also operates the Vehicle Innovation Center (VIC), the first and only innovation lab of its kind dedicated to advancing bus and coach technology and providing workforce development.
Since opening in late 2017, the VIC has hosted over 400 interactive events, welcoming 9,000 industry professionals for EV and infrastructure training.
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