PG&E Helps Fresno County Serve Rural Residents With Clean Transit

A lot is at stake for the Fresno County Rural Transit Agency.

The agency serves customers in more than 50 small, rural cities and communities across 6,000 square miles.

Most of those communities are disadvantaged based on health and economic outcomes. Air quality in the region is among the country’s worst. And state law requires public transit agencies to have all zero-emission fleets by 2040.

The agency’s new $20 million Selma Maintenance Facility marks a huge leap toward solving those issues.

The facility combines charging points for electric transit buses with a microgrid of solar power and battery energy storage. The center also has a maintenance shop and new agency office operations building.

With its heavy electric use and multiple functions, the center wasn’t easy to design or build.

More than two years would pass between groundbreaking and ribbon-cutting. Pulling it off would require a tremendous effort from PG&E’s Service Planning & Design team, with heavy assists from Permitting and General Construction.

PG&E also provided $660,000 in incentives for the facility’s EV chargers through its EV Fleet Program.

“This project is a first in medium- to heavy-duty charging stations,” said PG&E Service Planning Manager Juan Mejia. “It has the most advanced type of charging on the market. The project’s design and construction are a testament to Fresno County’s vision, and to PG&E’s partnership alongside the county.”

Fresno County Rural Transit Agency General Manager Moses Stites called the design and buildout “quite a process.”

“We might not have pursued this project had we known what we were getting into,” he said. “But PG&E was a very collaborative partner in overcoming our challenges.”

‘Complex and challenging’

There was no question about the center’s importance, said Dan Vang, a PG&E senior new business representative.

“If you’re elderly, you live in a rural area and you don’t have a car, how do you get to your doctor’s appointment in Fresno? We had the opportunity to provide the answer — and at the greatest technological level,” Vang said. “When we’re able to match the efforts of state, local and grassroots teams to meet residents’ needs, it shows how impactful we can be in our hometowns.”

Plans called for more than 30 plug-in charge points for transit buses, vans and cars. The center would also include a rare, wireless induction charger. Electricity would come from 1,100 solar panels generating 1.2 megawatts, supported by two 373-kilowatt battery storage systems for power when the sun wasn’t shining.

The site would also house a 15,000-square-foot building with offices, dispatch and technician training. A natural gas-powered generator would provide backup power to the building.

The plan would need two of everything: Two studies to measure energy demand. Two meters. Two transformers. Two sets of switchgear to manage the flow of electricity between grid and center.

“This kind of project hadn’t been done,” Stites said. “A lot of the electrical technology would have to be designed from scratch. It was a very integrated, complex and challenging project.”

For PG&E, the first task was to figure out how to provide the electricity the center would need.

PG&E’s study of electric demand showed that the powerline circuit closest to the site was full. Another nearby circuit could handle the demand. But its access was across the street, 800 feet away — and fenced off by a neighbor.

Using that circuit would require a redesign of the project’s utility service. PG&E would also need to research rights of way to determine whether the fence could be there and talk to the neighbor about removing it.

On top of those issues, federal, state and local funding streams were at stake.

“They had their funding, and we had to get it done,” Vang said. “We had an emergency meeting early in the project. We had our whole team there, and Moses had his. I told him to give me his deadline, and to give us his trust — we were going to make it happen.”

‘Err on the side of effort’

For the PG&E team, the company’s virtues led the way.

Those virtues include being nimble, trustworthy and empathetic.

“All the supervisors, designers and construction crews were very flexible, and that really helped,” he said. “You always want to err on the side of effort.”

Being a trusted partner was also critical.

Vang stayed in constant contact with the transit agency, inspectors and the construction team.

“He poured in a lot of extra hours to make sure that we matched the customer’s critical path,” Mejia said.

Stites said PG&E “made every good-faith effort to keep us going.”

Consider access to that circuit across the street.

PG&E had to confirm its legal right-of-way, convince the neighbor to remove the fence, and get permission from the city of Selma to install underground equipment up to the circuit.

The city gave PG&E until Dec. 31, 2024 to finish the work.

“Sure enough, PG&E and their subcontractors were out there working during the holidays and got it done,” Stites said. “This project took tremendous amounts of collaboration, flexibility and patience. It also took a lot of expertise and electrical ingenuity.”

PG&E energized the facility in January 2025. That gave the transit agency several months to finish its buildout for its August ribbon-cutting.

Mejia spoke at the event, along with Congressman Jim Costa, Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula and Selma Mayor Scott Robertson.

“This project represents a shared commitment to building a cleaner, more reliable energy future for our community,” Mejia said in his remarks. “We’re proud to be a part of it.”

Vang attended the event as well.

“That moment provided a true hometown feel,” he said. “Everyone was there to celebrate this important local project.”

Transit — and beyond

Today, the facility’s 1.2 megawatts of solar power provide 120% of what it needs to run. The transit agency puts the excess 20% back onto the grid to help with demand needs in the immediate area, Stites said.

More broadly, PG&E’s EV Fleet Program continues to add participants. The program has more than 6,600 medium- to heavy-duty vehicles committed to electrify, Mejia said.

For context, there were 3,780 such EVs on the road in California in 2023.

Dean Kunesh, a customer onboarding specialist with PG&E’s Advisory Services team, is working with Stites on a research paper based on the agency’s electrification experiences to help other transit agencies electrify their fleets.

The paper will offer guidance on how to get started, issues to look out for and how to manage the project with “great communication and follow-up,” Kunesh said.

“Helping a rural transit agency in a disadvantaged community is a great example of the customers we strive to serve,” Kunesh added. “This project represents an exciting milestone that is bringing cleaner air, quieter streets and healthier community for all of us.”

Beyond transportation, Fresno County plans to use Kunesh’s research paper to plan affordable housing with solar microgrids and EV-charging points in other underserved communities.

“Dean is a pioneer and a leader, and his work is instrumental to our goals in Fresno County, and the transit industry in this demanding and challenging electrification process,” Stites said.