Hauling

The New York City Department of Sanitation (DSNY) has selected Waste Management (WM), Houston, for a $3.3 billion, 20-year contract to export waste from the Hamilton Avenue and Southwest Brooklyn marine transfer stations. This contract is the final long-term waste export contract of the city’s 2006 Solid Waste Management Plan (SWMP), a comprehensive, long-term plan to equitably and sustainably collect and dispose of New York City’s municipal solid waste (MSW).

“For far too long, a few communities in the five boroughs have been saturated by waste transfer stations and resulting truck traffic,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio says. “We are taking a huge step in shifting the burden away from those communities. When these stations are fully up and running, overburdened communities will breathe easier knowing 200 fewer trucks per day will be carrying trash through Brooklyn.”

The SWMP is a five-borough plan that will handle New York City’s waste and is designed to offer flexibility and resiliency in the case of a natural disaster or other emergency situation.

The plan provides New York City with new infrastructure and mandates a switch from reliance on long-haul trucking to a system of marine and rail transfer stations spread throughout the five boroughs.

Full implementation of the plan is designed to reduce annual truck travel by more than 60 million miles, including more than 5 million miles in and around New York City, and will cut greenhouse gas emissions associated with waste transport by more 34,000 tons annually.

The SWMP includes areas such as north Brooklyn, the south Bronx and southeast Queens. The opening of the Hamilton Avenue Marine Transfer Station (MTS) later this year will redirect approximately 1,600 tons of refuse per day and 200 DSNY trucks per day from private land-based transfer stations in environmental justice areas in Brooklyn, including 780 tons per day and 100 trucks per day from north Brooklyn alone. The Southwest Brooklyn Marine Transfer Station will further redistribute the burden of waste when it opens in 2018.

Under the terms of the contract, WM will accept sealed waste containers from the DSNY at the Hamilton Avenue and Southwest Brooklyn marine transfer stations. Cranes will load the containers onto barges, which will be transported to a WM-owned intermodal facility in Elizabeth, New Jersey. From there, containers will be transported to a rail yard, where they will be loaded onto rail cars for transport to their final destinations.

The $3.3 billion contract includes disposal facilities in Virginia and upstate New York. It has an initial term of 20 years with two optional five-year contract extensions.

The SWMP is supported by an environmental impact statement finding no significant adverse impacts, was overwhelmingly approved by the city council and was authorized by the State Department of Environmental Conservation in 2006.

Waste Management owns and operates rail-based transfer stations in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx that last year exported more than 1.2 million tons of DSNY-collected municipal solid waste. The contract is subject to review by the Comptroller’s Office. The Hamilton Avenue MTS is scheduled to open in fall 2017.

Republic Services, Phoenix, has unveiled a new compressed natural gas (CNG) fueling station and 50 new CNG-powered trucks to serve customers throughout the Twin Cities region in Minnesota. The new CNG trucks replace diesel-powered trucks in the company’s Twin Cities-based fleet.

“We are dedicated to providing our customers and the communities we serve with outstanding service while doing business in the most sustainable manner possible,” says Jeff Marone, general manager of Republic Services. “We are leveraging alternative fuels and fleet innovation to help reduce fleet greenhouse gas emissions and do our part to preserve our ‘blue planet.’ We believe we have a responsibility to lead by example, with a commitment to reduce carbon emissions whenever possible.”

Republic operates 115 collection vehicles that serve customers in Eden Prairie and Hennepin County, Minnesota. Nearly 50 percent of Republic’s fleet in the area is powered by the domestic natural gas fuel source. Clean Energy Fuels, Newport Beach, California, designed and built the CNG fueling station.

Based on calculations from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the carbon emissions reduction resulting from the company’s Twin Cities CNG-powered fleet is equivalent to planting more than 30,000 mature trees annually, Republic says.

Republic has more than 500 employees in the Twin Cities area who serve more than 200,000 households and more than 10,000 commercial customers. Republic also owns and operates two recycling centers and two transfer stations locally.

Nationwide, Republic operates a fleet of 2,500 CNG vehicles and 38 natural gas fueling stations. According to the company, its CNG fleet helps to save 18 million gallons of diesel fuel annually. Republic says its goal is to reduce fleet greenhouse gas emissions by 3 percent by 2018.