Oct. 28--The DART board voted Tuesday to solicit bids from firms able to supply nearly 600 new natural gas-powered buses, ending a nearly yearlong debate over whether the transit agency's next-generation fleet should be fueled by natural gas or diesel.

The vote came two weeks after staff members reversed course from last December, and recommended buying the natural gas buses. They cited falling natural gas prices as the reason they no longer think diesel buses are the best buy, despite more than $100 million in construction funds that will have to be borrowed upfront to pay for the conversion to a natural-gas fleet.

Those costs, including interest, will be more than offset by fuel savings the agency expects to achieve by choosing natural gas, top staff members have promised the Dallas Area Rapid Transit board.

Citing the lower fuel costs, the DART operations committee overwhelmingly approved the switch to natural gas at its meeting two weeks ago.

Now that the board has voted, the staff will begin seeking bids from bus manufacturers and firms to build the stations, spokesman Morgan Lyons said. It will also seek to "hedge" the cost of natural gas for 10 years.

The savings expected from purchasing the natural-gas buses were calculated against rough estimates for diesel buses that were submitted as part of the side-by-side comparisons late last year. No up-to-date pricing for diesel fuel, or for the buses themselves, was calculated this time.

The switch is a significant win for Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert, who lobbied the DART board strenuously last year to reject the staff's proposal to go with diesel buses. He said then that choosing natural gas over diesel would help brand Dallas as an environmentally friendly, forward-looking city.

He also argued that DART would be acting in the country's best interest if it helped move the country off a fuel source that is heavily imported, such as diesel, and instead used more of a fuel that is mostly purchased from domestic sources.

One of Dallas' leading businessmen and a financial contributor to Leppert, T. Boone Pickens, is leading a national campaign to increase the country's use of natural gas, and to lower its dependence on oil. He is founder of Clean Energy Fuels, a California-based firm that submitted last fall's bid to supply the fuel, buses and stations should DART choose natural gas.

Staff later determined that it would be cheaper to buy the fuel itself, probably through a state government purchasing plan, and to contract with a separate party to build the stations.

Tuesday's vote merely instructs the staff to seek new bids for natural-gas buses, and no bid from diesel manufacturers will be solicited.

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