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Taxi of Tomorrow Could Reduce Fleet Fuel Efficiency


Photo (cc) Karsan

Despite a call to bring the city's cab industry into the future, yellow taxis aren't going as green as some would hope.

Within a month, the city will select a new model for its 13,000-strong iconic taxi fleet -- the last step of a more than yearlong competition titled Taxi of Tomorrow. No matter which of the three remaining vehicles the city chooses, the selection might make the city's cab convoy less fuel efficient than it is on average now.

Currently, the city's taxi fleet is one-third hybrid and two-thirds, gas-guzzling Crown Victorias courtesy of the Ford Motor Co. The majority of the city's hybrid fleet are Ford Escapes, which average 34 miles per gallon during city driving. In total, including hybrid vehicles, the city's fleet has an average of 22 miles per gallon.

Under the competition, the city will choose one vehicle and phase out the rest of the fleet -- including hybrids. The contract would span 10 years, and officials estimate it will be worth $1 billion.

At least one of the vehicles under consideration by the Taxi and Limousine Commission, the Ford Transit Connect, gets only 21 miles per gallon during city driving. The commission would not reveal the gas mileage for the other two vehicles under consideration nor would their respective companies: the Nissan NV200 and the Turkey-based Karsan. A diesel version of the Nissan is used in Europe, but the Karsan is still in development. None of the options are manufactured in the United States.

A spokesperson at the U.S. National Renewable Energy Lab, said the agency did not keep records of foreign vehicles' fuel economies.

"If they go forward with one of these three finalists, it’s a step backward at least in the short term for fuel efficiency and tailpipe emissions," said Mark Izeman, director of the New York urban program at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The competition culminates a protracted battle between the Bloomberg administration and the taxi industry. Ultimately, environmental advocates say, the administration is on the losing side.

Making Taxis Cleaner?

For its part, the city blames Washington.

In February, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear a case that struck down city-based incentives to encourage the taxi industry to purchase greener and cleaner vehicles. Under the now-defunct regulation, the city would financially penalize taxi owners if they failed to purchase hybrid vehicles.

The policy attempted to make good on Mayor Michael Bloomberg's commitment to create a cab fleet with a fuel efficiency greater than 25 miles per gallon. The proposal was a major tenant of Bloomberg's environmental agenda -- otherwise known as PlaNYC 2030.

The courts said the incentives amounted to a mandate and argued only Congress has the power to regulate fuel efficiency.

"Obviously we wanted to build fuel efficiency into the Taxi of Tomorrow, and would have done so if we were not limited by the interpretation of the statue," said Allan Fromberg, a spokesperson for the Taxi and Limousine Commission.

Despite the setback in court, city and federal officials are still attempting to regulate fuel efficiency in the Big Apple.

On Monday, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, Bloomberg and Rep. Jerrold Nadler said they would introduce legislation in Washington to allow cities to regulate their own taxi industry's fuel efficiency. The same legislation was introduced in 2009, but failed to gain traction. Cities like Washington, DC, Las Vegas, Boston, San Francisco and Los Angeles have signed on in support of the measure.

While championing the mayor's commitment to fuel efficiency standards, some environmental advocates question whether there is the political willpower to actually get it done on Capitol Hill.

And even if the legislation were to move forward this session, it's unclear whether a potential Taxi of Tomorrow contract, which is locked in for 10 years, could be modified to meet higher fuel efficiency standards.

Taxi for the 21st Century

Some of the models under consideration -- all of which resemble a more modern minivan -- hope to eventually phase in cleaner cab versions, according to the Taxi and Limousine Commission.

Fromberg said Nissan hopes to make their model eventually entirely electric. Before that could occur, the city would have to establish infrastructure for taxis to go to charging stations instead of the pump.

According to its promotional site, Karsan can be "quickly and cost-effectively modified to conform to the city’s preference for electric, compressed gas, hybrid or other advanced power system."

But those who have battled the Bloomberg administration's taxi policy -- including The Metropolitan Taxicab Board of Trade, who represents taxi company owners -- say fuel efficiency should take a back seat to other more important amenities.

"As operators we have to have safety and durability and affordability," said Michael Woloz, a spokesperson for the board. "That’s our main concern."

Earlier this week, the taxicab board filed another motion in federal court to compel the city to allow companies to purchase the Ford Transit Connect now. Woloz said selecting one cab model would crush competitive prices, because one manufacturer would have exclusive rights to the New York City taxi market. Woloz said he wouldn't be surprised if the city backed out of the competition altogether.

"The Taxi of Tomorrow is far from a sure thing," he said.

Administration Considers Waste-to-Energy


Photo (cc) Kai Schreiber
This waste-to-energy plant in Newark was built almost 20 years ago and continues to burn garbage, including some of New York City's refuse.

The Bloomberg administration is once again talking trash.

Five years after the City Council approved a new solid waste management plan and a decade after the closure of the Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island, the Bloomberg administration is seriously considering the development of waste-to-energy facilities in the five boroughs, officials said Tuesday. Waste-to-energy -- commonly thought of as the process of heating or burning trash and converting it to energy -- was mulled over earlier in Bloomberg's tenure. Mayor Ed Koch also considered the technology, but community opposition killed his proposal.

Now waste-to-energy is back on the administration's radar, and the Department of Sanitation will release a "request for information" to gauge interest from industry experts in the oft-controversial technology.

Officials see waste-to-energy as a potential solution to the skyrocketing cost of exporting city trash to out-of-state landfills -- a price tag that has risen by 62 percent per ton over the last decade. Already a majority of refuse in Manhattan is trucked to an incinerator in Newark and burned.

"The monetary costs of long distance transportation and disposal are quite high," said David Bragdon, the city's director of long term planning and sustainability. "When you look at the landfill and transportation market, the city is spending more and more money every year. I think we will, as we did in the earlier plan, call for an examination of waste-to-energy conversions."

The toughest challenge for the city will be siting such facilities. The equal distribution of infrastructure throughout the five boroughs has been a sensitive issue from Williamsburg to Hunts Point. Already, advocates say, developers have targeted neighborhoods, like Sunset Park, to hone in on potential sites for waste-to-energy facilities.

"I feel a little troubled by the fact that whenever these proposals are made our communities are targeted," said Elizabeth Yeampierre, the executive director of the United Puerto Rican Association of Sunset Park.

Bragdon, however, said no particular site is under consideration.

"Where [these facilities] might occur is a wide open question," Bragdon told Gotham Gazette.

The preliminary discussion has split the city's environmental community. Some fear facilities could land in neighborhoods already overburdened with waste transfer stations. The rest applaud the move. To ensure the city has a sustainable sanitation plan for the future, supporters argue it must deal with some of its solid waste within the five boroughs.

Trucking Trash

Reaching its height in popularity during the 1970s and a staple in many European cities, waste-to-energy in its most basic form involves an incinerator burning trash and using turbines to create usable electricity. In recent years, the definition has expanded to other renewable technologies, like anaerobic digestion, which takes methane out of decomposing refuse, or thermal technologies, which heats refuse at extremely high temperatures to create energy.

The move to develop such facilities here would be a drastic change from how the city deals with refuse now.

In the 10 years since the closure of the Fresh Kills, the city has spent the majority of its time trucking trash on diesel-spewing trucks to out-of-state landfills in Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Virginia.

In 2006, the City Council approved a new solid waste management plan that moved trash onto barges and railroads -- an attempt to reduce carbon emissions. The city also approved several new waste transfer stations, including two in Manhattan, to distribute the trash burden throughout the five boroughs.

The Bloomberg administration's environmental agenda, otherwise known as PlaNYC 2030, was released later that same year. It said relatively little on solid waste management. Officials say taking on trash is politically sensitive and can quickly become mired in community opposition.

On Earth Day in 2010, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced the city would once again tackle solid waste management and incorporate it into his environmental agenda. The announcement, advocates said, offered an opportunity to revisit the city's reliance on out-of-state landfills.

"It's time the city take a look from a cost perspective and from an environmental perspective at solid waste disposal," said Marcia Bystryn, the executive director of the New York League of Conservation Voters.

The mayor plans to release a retooled PlaNYC 2030 on Earth Day next month. Advocates and officials said it would deal with solid waste management.

Waste to Energy

Should the administration move forward with waste-to-energy facilities, it's unclear what technology it will select.

"A lot of people when they hear waste-to-energy, what they assume is incinerator. That is a misconception," said Rohit Aggarwala, the former head of the city's sustainability agenda who now serves as a special advisor to the C40 climate leadership group. The group is chaired by Bloomberg. "I'm almost certain that there are waste to energy technologies that would make sense in New York," he said.

Environmental advocates have expressed interest in anaerobic digestion. The city already extracts methane from Fresh Kills. A study conducted for the New York City Economic Development Corp. last summer found a digestion facility in Hunts Point, one of the largest food markets in the country, could be a rich resource for the city -- if it wanted to make the investment.

Experts at Columbia University's Earth Institute say traditional waste-to-energy plants, which incinerate trash, have gotten cleaner. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency established guidelines to restrict emissions from these plants in the 1980s. There are 87 waste-to-energy plants in the country, several of which are on Long Island, said Nickolas Themelis, a professor at Columbia.

Opponents, however, question whether these types of facilities jibe with the administration's overall goal: to make the city more sustainable. Some say the administration should focus on increasing the city's dismal recycling rate instead.

"What is the incentive for the Department of Sanitation?" asked Eddie Bautista, executive director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance. "What's the incentive to recycle and reduce waste [when] if we feed the beast, we'll actually get energy out of it?"

After Cuts and Firing, Can Agency Still Protect New York's Environment?


endangered
Photo by Astoria4u
The clean up of Newtown Creek (above) would be in jeopardy if New York withdrew from the federal Superfund program.

"Pete Grannis was fired by Gov. Paterson because he had unpleasant news about what his planned cuts would mean to the state," said River Keeper executive director Paul Gallay.

Many activists and others agree. When Gov. David Paterson fired Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Pete Grannis in late October, after a memo leaked detailing how cuts would prevent the agency from protecting the environment, legislators and environmental activists joined together to denounce the move and praise Grannis' long service. Grannis denied leaking the memo.

"They shot the messenger," said Gallay.

While controversy over the firing still rages, advocates say the focus must now shift to the agency itself and if it can protect New Yorkers and the environment with cut after cut. "We need to move on and focus now on the memo and what it says about this agency's ability to function," said Laura Haight, senior environmental associate for the New York Public Interest Research Group.

Cuts and More Cuts

According to the memo, the Department of Environmental Conservation may no longer be able to carry out the most basic of its functions.

The DEC had about 3,775 workers to start 2008; since then 260 staffers left under an early retirement program. and 150 more could soon be handed pink slips. Staffers from scientists in wildlife labs to office workers and site inspectors have left their jobs leaving the agency understaffed.

According to the unsigned memo, the DEC will not be able to properly staff cleanup sites, monitor natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale, make sure polluters keep up with state standards and manage wildlife at parks. Environmentalists say the crippling of the agency hurts business too.

"There will be huge delays in licensing. They (the DEC) aren't staffed to do permitting anymore," said Marcia Bystryn, executive director of the League of Conservation Voters. "Businesses need them before they can start projects, and in this financial climate, time is money -- the delay could kill development across the state."

Gallay agrees that the DEC's current situation could be bad for New Yorkers, the environment and business. "Industry wants a prompt response. Having low staff at the DEC hurts good businesses," he said. "The only people that benefit from lax regulation are bad businesses, and that hurts the businesses that are doing the right things. People think industry wants weak regulations. They don’t want weak, they want responsive, they want people to work with." According to Gallay, industry is going to have a hard time finding any sort of response from the DEC. Other environmental groups say that cleanup projects have been abandoned because the department doesn’t have enough staff to work on procuring project grants.

Firing Fallout

Grannis was perceived to be unafraid to speak out about what the cuts would mean for the state -- he is close to many legislators because of the years he spent as a member of the Assembly. Albany Assemblymember Jack McEneny called Grannis to tell him, "You are my hero" after the firing. Albany State Sen. Neil Breslin described Grannis as "the brightest person I know in state government."

Controversy over the firing still rages -- Grannis is so popular that legislators have been lead to speculate that his firing was part of the "dirty work" Paterson has undertaken as a favor for Andrew Cuomo to make things easier when the governor elect takes charge. They think Paterson is making unpopular moves for Cuomo because as a lame duck he has nothing left to lose.

Others openly wonder if Paterson fired Grannis or if the move was made independently by top Paterson aide Larry Schwartz. The Times Union, which first broke the DEC memo, reported that Schwartz phoned Grannis demanding he resign because the memo leaked. Grannis reportedly refused and demanded to speak to Paterson. Schwartz refused and then fired him. "Who exactly is running the state?" asked McEneny. "Schwartz or Paterson?" The Assembly plans hearings later this month.

Some activists and legislators want Cuomo to reappoint Grannis.

Leaving Superfund?

Beyond Grannis' firing and the cuts at the DEC, Paterson has proposed withdrawing New York from Superfund projects to clean up toxic sites. Discussing the cuts in a radio program on Oct. 28, Paterson said, "In DEC there will be job losses of approximately 150. This will cause us to reduce some of the services that we have. We’ll have to close a few educational programs, we will eliminate the state participation in Superfund. In other words where the federal government is conducting superfund activities, the state will not be involved."

The federal Environmental Protection Agency oversees Superfund projects across the nation, and whoever polluted the site is supposed to cover the cost, but the state pitches in 10 percent of the cost of the projects if the polluter can’t be found. In New York, state DEC staffers familiar with the cleanup area help the EPA adjust its plans to specific local concerns. No state in the union has ever withdrawn from the Superfund program.

Two long polluted sites in the city -- the Gowanus Canal and Newtown Creek -- are slated for clean up under the Superfund program. There are 114 Superfund sites in the state. What a state withdrawal would mean for these clean ups is unclear. An EPA spokesman said the agency had not received any proposal from the state and therefore could not speculate on what it would mean.

In fact, Paterson's proposal strikes some environmentalists and legislators as so outlandish that they do not take it completely seriously. "I'm not sure if it is a negotiating ploy, being used as a bargaining chip or what," said Bystryn. "I am certainly optimistic that they won't do this. We would be the first state in the nation."

But Gallay has a different take. "There is no sense in talking about bargaining chips when you have public health and safety at stake. These sites need funding. Some of these sites have been turned into recycling centers or receive other new investment after the cleanup. It helps the local economy. It is essential that the DEC stay involved. The feds have their plans and do a good job, but it is important to have the local office involved," he said.

As to how a withdrawl might work, Yancey Roy, spokesperson for the DEC, explained in an e-mail, "Typically speaking, EPA is the lead agency on federal [Superfund] sites and the state provides assistance/consultation. Often, this involves the state assigning a project manager to stay up to speed on the site, review test results and provide consultation, support and a state perspective. When warranted, DEC has assigned more than one person to a cleanup." In other words DEC staffers would no longer participate.

Gallay, who worked for the DEC, said that during his time there he saw how agency representatives from local offices familiar with the community near the site were able to help "get the right kind of cleanup for the community."

Laura Height of NYPIRG said that Paterson’s proposal flies in the face of logic. "Opting out of the superfund program makes no sense," she said. If the state needs money, she said it could apply for federal management assistance grants, such as the one it now has for the clean up of PCBs in the Hudson River But, she said, the state has not done this. "I don’t know if it is because they are short staffed or what," she added.

Looking Backward and Forward

Environmental advocates are united in their disdain for the way Paterson has dealt with the environment during the budget crisis, but they do not agree about what they can expect from the incoming Cuomo administration. Gallay estimates that most other agencies have faced about 8 percent cuts in their budgets; he said the DEC faces over 20 percent worth of cuts.

"During hard times we want a strong leader who can make smart, careful cuts. It is all going to hurt, but you want the cuts to be thoughtful. Paterson has not done that. He has made stupid cuts that have backfired on him," said Height.

Bystryn said she is ready to look ahead. "I'm not sure the environment was ever a major concern for Paterson, but Cuomo went to the trouble of putting together policy books which represent parts of an environmental agenda. He also went out of his way to seek our endorsement, and he didn't do that with everyone." Bystryn said she expects Cuomo will consult with her on the DEC budget come January.

"The state is nearly bankrupt, there are clearly going to be cuts, but we need to review each agency and find out what the core mission is and then make sure they are fully staffed to carry out that mission," she said. "I think the DEC's main mission is to protect New York's air, water and environment, and we need to make sure it is more than adequately staffed to do that."

Gallay said he has great hopes that the Cuomo administration will correct what he sees as Paterson's misdeeds. "All this governor has done is pour gas on the fire. I have every hope that Gov. Cuomo will administer his environmental agenda. He is a goal oriented man, and he published his environmental agenda, and he is not the kind of guy that wants to miss his goals. To meet them I think he will have to properly fund the DEC."

Cuomo’s Plans

Cuomo, though, has gone on the record supporting layoffs at the DEC. He has also taken an open stance on "hydrofracking" to extract natural gas from the Marcellus Shale. His "Cleaner, Greener NY" environmental agenda says he supports drilling, but only if it is safe. Environmentalists take that to mean that Cuomo would allow the drilling with DEC oversight, as well as with safeguards to insure the process will not pollute surrounding water supplies.

His statement also supports improving standards for the clean up of brownfields, partly contaminated former industrial sites, and backs tougher clean air standards. "The state is well served by enacting regulations to address climate change," the Cuomo campaign wrote. "Statutory standards provide certainty to industries and investment will follow." That again indicates to environmentalists that Cuomo supports staffing the agency that oversees polluters.

In its response to Cuomo"s "Cleaner, Greener NY," Environmental Advocates of New York praised a number of Cuomo's stances but its executive director, Rob Moore, closed with this:

"In the wake of the sudden dismissal of Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Pete Grannis on Oct. 21, ‘Cleaner, Greener NY’ may underestimate the mess that the next governor inherits at the DEC and the state's other environmental agencies. ... Over the last few years, New York's environmental agencies have been decimated. Many aspects of the 'Cleaner, Greener NY' agenda will be impossible to implement without a significant re-investment in the agencies and an aggressive rebuilding effort. The success or failure of the Cuomo campaign's agenda depends on a commitment to rebuild these agencies."

Height said she does not want to wish anything tragic on New York, but she is concerned that. as the DEC becomes less effective, conditions are developing that could lead to real environmental disaster. "The BP oil spill happened when people were asleep at the switch," she said. "We know the agency is already too short staffed to monitor polluters, so we are trusting polluters to follow the rules, and that is dangerous when it comes to public health and safety."



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