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October
17,
2005
The
Philadelphia Diesel Difference - Working Group Meeting
Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC)
190 North Independence Mall West,
8th Floor,
Philadelphia, PA 19106
IN ATTENDANCE:
Brett
Alkins, Johnson Matthey Inc.
Emily Bockian Lansburg, Energy Cooperative of PA, Phila. Fry-O-Diesel
Daniel Brown, Independent Consultant
Ken Brown, University of Pennsylvania
Ed Carreras, SynerTec Int'l
Ray Chalmers, U.S. EPA, Region 3
Eric Cheung, Clean Air Council/PDD
Fred Cummings, Philadelphia Airport
Morris Fine, AMS/PDD
John Hadalski, City of Philadelphia
Jack LeBeau, E Global Solutions
Lisa Magee, Philadelphia Regional Port Authority
Perry Pandya, U.S. EPA, Region 3
Jienki Synn, DVRPC
Alison Tracy, AMS
Barbara Wilson, Krapf Bus Co.
MINUTES TAKEN BY:
Eric Cheung
INTRODUCTIONS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Morris
began the meeting by announcing that the Philadelphia Health Department
has hired Alison Tracy to work on voluntary programs. Her work will include
activities relating to the City's settlement with Sunoco and other grants
as well as PDD.
On the latest with the Sunoco settlement, Morris said that there has been
a delay with court approval of the consent decree, which should have occurred
at the end of September. Instead the Community Labor Refinery Tracking Committee
has filed a complaint relating to the settlement that will require judicial
review. Morris stated that something will be worked out and that the existing
consent decree will not be impacted. The new settlement should be approved
by the court by the end of October.
Turning to the new Mid-Atlantic regional clean diesel collaborative, Morris noted that PDD will work with the new group to bring funding to the Delaware Valley. The regional collaborative's website will be up sometime in November and Eric will forward the link to everyone. There will be a focus on such diesel engine niches as ports, distributed generators, municipal fleets and school bus fleets. The preliminary stakeholders will be local, state and federal governmental agencies. It will expand to include more after the kick-off event, which is to take place possibly as early as January.
John Hadalski asked if anyone knew about a potential distribution issue relating to the switchover from existing diesel to ULSD fuel. Ed Carreras explained the problem by noting that with so much fuel being switched over, there may be the possibility of contamination from other fuel using the same pipelines that has not been desulfurized, like jet fuel. Morris replied that there has been a 90-day delay of full phase-in of 15 ppm sulfur diesel fuel to provide more time to deal with the distribution issue. Jack LeBeau added that according to Bill Coughlin from Sunoco it will take time to clean the pipeline out so that it can transport diesel fuel that is 15 ppm sulfur, but meeting the deadline ought to be feasible. Brett Alkins asserted that at an Association of Petroleum Refiners, Katrina was cited as a possible reason for postponing ULSD introduction indefinitely.
PHILADELPHIA DIESEL DIFFERENCE ACTIVITIES UPDATE:
Eric noted that Clean Air Council and AMS are working out a contract between the two organizations that would allow the Council to continue as co-administrator of Philadelphia Diesel Difference another year. The current agreement is tied to an EPA contract that closed at the end of September, 2005. Eric also explained to PDD stakeholders that the Council's server crashed, which meant he has not been able to make changes to the PDD website for a couple weeks. The problem should be resolved soon. Concerning the status of the Philadelphia Asthma Bus, Eric reported that the retrofit technology for the bus has been shipped over and will need to be installed by the Bus's mechanics. The next step will be to have the bus use ULSD fuel.
PDD
SUBCOMMITTEE REPORTS:
Eric explained that the addition of this agenda item is to provide a space
for updates on the various subcommittees that serve PDD. He noted that following
the Working Group meeting, there was going to be a meeting of the Criteria
Subcommittee to begin the process of awarding recognition for successful
clean diesel fleets. Morris added that some fleets will be recognized soon,
including the Asthma Bus. Morris suggested that Dr. Larry Robinson from
the City be involved in publicizing the Asthma Bus's diesel retrofit activity.
GRANT OPPORTUNITIES:
Eric said that Philadelphia Clean Cities submitted the Walt Whitman Truck Stop electrification demonstration project application for consideration under PA's Alternative Fuels Incentive Grant program. PDD, PECO Energy, the Walt Whitman Truck Stop and ShurePower are partners in this venture with Clean Cities. Eric added that Clean Air Council is still working on a possible grant application for Coastal Zone Management funding relating to the port.
MONTHLY
PRESENTATION:
This month there were two presentations made to provide more details on
recently enacted federal legislation, which offer funding for clean diesel
projects: the Transportation Bill and the Energy Bill. Elizabeth Schoonmaker
from DVRPC spoke on the new Transportation Bill (called SAFETEA-LU). The
law offers $286.4 billion in funding over six years. It took two years to
develop, necessitating the predecessor transportation funding law (TEA-21)
to be extended after its expiration date. SAFETEA-LU provides a 38% increase
in guaranteed spending over TEA-21.
Pennsylvania's share of SAFETEA-LU represents an increase of $1.646 billion a year for highway projects and $1.821 billion a year for transit projects over TEA-21. Elizabeth said it was uncertain how much money the Delaware Valley region would get because apportionment of the funding among different regions of the State is currently being done. What she could say is that of the funding available to the State, $100 million has been earmarked for specific highway projects and $33 million for traffic projects in this region. 20% of the earmarks are released each year over five years.
Looking at highway funding in more detail, Elizabeth noted that a new focus of the transportation bill is safety, which is manifested in the "Safe Routes to School Program." Also of interest, modern roundabouts can be funded at 100% under SAFETEA-LU. Lastly, crash data will now be made available to the public.
Turning to the transit side, Elizabeth noted that the Congestion Mitigation Air Quality (CMAQ) program, which funds emission-reducing projects returns under SAFETEA-LU with some improvements of relevance to clean diesel advocates. It now specifically includes advanced truck stop electrification projects and it gives priority to funding diesel retrofit projects. DVRPC is considering having a competitive round of CMAQ funding for Delaware Valley regional projects as early as the Fall of 2006.
Eric clarified that DVRPC's competitive process is not the only way to access CMAQ funding. Nor is the full amount available under CMAQ offered as part of the competitive process. If one of the counties in the region decides to include a diesel retrofit project as a "Transportation Improvement Plan" (TIP), it can also be funded via CMAQ without having to participate in a competition. Morris asked Barbara Wilson if Krapf Bus Company alerts the counties to CMAQ funding opportunities. She replied that Krapf does have contacts with counties and will work with them to encourage them to consider diesel retrofit projects as CMAQ funding proposals. John Hadalski added that it would be helpful to expand the stakeholder base of PDD to include representatives from the county planning departments. Eric said he will present at an upcoming meeting of DVRPC's advisory group, the Regional Transportation Committee (RTC), to better educate county planners on PDD and its clean diesel activities.
Jienki Synn remarked that the TIP process for Fiscal Year 2007 runs from now through April. If PDD wants to get clean diesel projects included on this TIP, Jienki advised the group to approach counties now, especially those representatives who sit on the RTC. Jienki said he could supply a list of RTC members.
For the second presentation, Eric explained that U.S. DOE provided a presentation on the new Energy Bill, but was prohibited from sending a representative to answer questions. This is because the financial amounts have been authorized, but not appropriated yet, and some of the provisions are controversial. Eric went through the presentation with the group, pointing out any items of interest to clean diesel advocates.
Some items Eric highlighted include the following:
$200 million in grant money for alternative fuel vehicles, hybrid electric vehicles, ULSD vehicles, and alternative fueling infrastructure, among others
The Clean School Bus program, which will pay school districts up to 50% of school bus replacement costs if the replacement bus is cleaner and up to 100% of diesel retrofit costs. $55 million is authorized for 2006 and 2007.
The Diesel Truck Retrofit and Fleet Modernization Program, which provides money to state and local governments to replace or retrofit old diesel vehicles. $20 million and $35 million have been authorized for 2006 and 2007, respectively.
$19.5 million in 2006, $30 million in 2007 and $45 million in 2008 have been authorized to conduct emissions analysis and to help deploy heavy duty vehicle idle reduction technologies.
$200 million a year over five years has been authorized to provide grants and loans to reduce diesel engine emissions.
NEXT
MEETING AND LOCATION:
The next meeting will be held November 21, 2005 at DVRPC's offices.