NGOs including Energy Vision, the New York League of Conservation Voters, WE ACT for Environmental Justice and prominent health experts called on the City to stop buying heavy duty diesel vehicles for its municipal fleets and to adopt superior alternatives to diesel that are available today. Specifically, they asked the City and MTA to take the following actions:
- Stop allocating funds for purchase of new heavy duty diesel trucks and MTA diesel buses now.
- Focus new heavy duty vehicle purchases on the best diesel alternatives. Electric models are
- expensive but well worth piloting. Natural gas models, equipped with ultra low emission Near Zero engines running on renewable natural gas (RNG) fuel made from organic wastes, are the cleanest, lowest carbon, and most cost effective today.
- Make the necessary capital expenditures on infrastructure and fleet garage modifications to support implementation of these alternatives.
Diesel exhaust is a major emitter of powerful greenhouse gases that cause climate change. Its nitrogen oxide and particulate emissions are a significant threat to public health. They cause cardiovascular damage and are a major trigger for asthma attacks. New York’s childhood asthma rates have tripled in the last three decades and now afflict an astonishing 13.3% of children living in New York City.
London has already banned procurement of new diesel vehicles and other major cities worldwide are restricting or eliminating them. In the US, many heavy duty fleets have converted to RNG.
While other major cities have adopted RNG, New York City has not. Its municipal fleets currently have few natural gas trucks and none run on RNG. NYC agencies continue to rely on diesel vehicles, and their budgets call for buying hundreds more in the years ahead.
“That deserves to end now,” said Joanna Underwood, founder and board member of Energy Vision, “and the budget process could help make it happen. The City Council could play a leadership role by framing its budget guidelines so they encourage city agencies to seize the opportunities they have to deploy better alternatives for this world class city.”
In City Council committee budget hearings in March, Energy Vision testified on the best strategies for replacing the City’s diesel vehicles. Today, Energy Vision sent the City Council and released publicly a new report on this topic, Ending the Diesel Era: Cleaner Fleets for a Healthier New York City. It assembles the latest evidence showing why it is vital for the City to eliminate diesel heavy duty vehicles and start adopting alternatives. Among the points it makes:
The City can’t meet its climate and air quality goals with diesel
The City deserves credit for setting ambitious clean air and greenhouse gas reduction goals. But to meet or exceed these goals will require a major, rapid shift away from diesel fuel. It has pledged to achieve the best air quality of any major U.S. city by 2050 and to cut GHGs 80% from its municipal fleet vehicles by 2035.
Heavy duty vehicles are the key
Across New York City’s fleets, heavy duty diesel trucks consume 60% of all fleet fuel and generate most of the harmful emissions, including greenhouse gases and health damaging particulate and nitrogen oxide pollution. They are therefore the most important and urgent targets for switching to non diesel alternatives.
To read the full story, visit http://energy-vision.org/press-releases/EV-get-off-diesel-release.pdf.