State officials have unveiled a plan to cut energy consumption and emissions in Yonkers and four other cities throughout New York.
The Five Cities Energy Plans program enlists the most populous cities outside of New York City ”” Yonkers, Albany, Buffalo, Syracuse and Rochester ”” as participants in a five-year, $35 million initiative supported by the New York Power Authority to drastically minimize energy costs and waste in both the public and private sectors. The project is an expansion of Gov. Andrew Cuomo”™s BuildSmart NY initiative that aims to increase energy efficiency in city buildings by 20 percent by 2020.
About $15 million of the $35 million will be used to cover startup costs and the salaries of six new hires. An energy manager will be employed in each city to lead their respective staffs and build awareness of community projects. A liaison will also be hired to communicate between the managers and NYPA headquarters in White Plains.
The remaining $20 million will be used as grant money for winners of a competition for the most sustainable and innovative ideas or research. The NYPA board was set to approve $12 million for the initial round of funding for the contest at its Feb. 26 meeting.
“The goal of the Five Cities Plans is to help the city save money over time,” said Steven Gosset, a NYPA spokesman. “We”™re estimating that the five cities combined could save $400 million a year in energy savings.”
The Five Cities Plans is a roadmap of recommendations to record data, educate the public and produce innovative projects specific to each region. The plans especially focus on energy planning and coordination, energy efficiency in buildings, transportation energy efficiency and energy distribution and supply.
Thomas G. Bourgeois, deputy director of the Pace Energy and Climate Center in White Plains, said that master plans like the Five Cities Plans are meant to be “living products, it”™s something you want to continue to revisit, but it can shape those long-term investment projects.”
And the ideas for Yonkers range from updating municipal buildings to use natural gas instead of less-efficient heating oils, developing rideshare programs and implementing citywide distribution generation technologies.
Of the five cities, Yonkers has the lowest energy consumption per capita, in large part because it is the most densely populated of the quintet. The city”™s biggest consumer of energy is the residential sector, which makes up 31 percent of overall consumption. However, many of the suggested initiatives are for city-owned buildings and municipal transportation, which account for 3 percent and 1 percent of energy consumption, respectively.
“We have control over municipal buildings so we can demonstrate and lead by example with our own buildings,” said Brad Tito, director of sustainability for the city of Yonkers. “We”™ve demonstrated that the cost of the projects can be more than fully offset by the energy savings over time.”
Of the city-owned buildings, schools account for the overwhelming majority of energy consumption, according to the report. At city schools, “We”™ve analyzed up to 17 roofs for their feasibility to put solar panels on them and we think in the next 18 months, let”™s say, we could use solar to supply 30 percent of the energy needs of those 17 buildings,” Tito said.
In some ways, the city is already ahead of the curve.
In July 2013, Yonkers launched the LED Streetlight Replacement Project, which replaced the city”™s 12,000 streetlights with light-emitting diodes that are more energy-efficient. City officials estimate they could save about $18 million over 10 years with the new lights.
“Yonkers is already one of the most energy-efficient cities in the nation,” Yonkers Mayor Mike Spano said in a statement. “This plan and our ongoing partnership with NYPA will help build on that success and cement Yonkers”™ position at the forefront of urban sustainability and as a national model for its green initiatives.”
Looking forward, Tito said there is a big push for microgrids, which he said could connect critical infrastructure, like a hospital, to individual power grids that would provide energy during emergencies. He added that they are very complicated systems to put together, but can be very beneficial.
“The bigger thing is now we have a plan. It”™s not like the plan is published and the band starts playing and we march off into the sunset. This is where the hard work starts,” he said.
