DALLAS, Texas --- The Environmental Protection Agency and its Blue Skyways Collaborative announced more than $678,000 in grants to communities in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas to help cut air pollution from school buses. In Texas, the North Central Texas Council of Governments was awarded $176,674 to retrofit and replace an estimated 60 school buses throughout a 16-county area. The project is expected to reduce more than 24,000 pounds of smog-forming pollutants and 840 pounds of particulate matter per year. A second grant of $145,049 was also awarded to the Capital Area Council of Governments to retrofit 40 diesel-powered buses in two school districts, purchase more than 200,000 gallons of biodiesel fuel, and buy one plug-in, diesel-electric hybrid bus. That project is expected to reduce more than 16,000 pounds of smog-forming pollutants and 560 pounds of particulate matter per year. "Blue Skyways is helping to equip buses with the latest technologies, so we can reduce their emissions by up to 90 percent," said EPA Regional Administrator Richard E. Greene. The goal of the grant program is to reduce children's exposure to diesel exhaust and the amount of air pollution created by diesel school buses. While pollution from diesel vehicles has health implications for everyone, it is especially harmful to children. Diesel exhaust contains nitrogen oxides, fine particles (soot) and air toxics. Nitrogen oxides are precursors of ozone (smog) and, when breathed in, fine particles can lodge deep in the lungs. The Blue Skyways Collaborative was formed in 2006 to encourage voluntary air emissions reductions throughout North America's heartland. Collaborative partners work to make this goal possible through implementation of projects that use innovations in diesel equipment, alternative fuels, renewable energy technologies and energy efficiency. With more than $271 million in projects, the program currently saves 125 million gallons of fuel per year, cuts 505,000 tons per year in greenhouse gases and reduces 40,000 tons per year in air pollutants. The collaborative's clean school bus program focuses specifically on bringing together partners from business, education, transportation and public health organizations to eliminate unnecessary bus idling, retrofit buses and replace the oldest buses with new, less polluting ones.