New York Program Targets Pollution

The New York Power Authority (NYPA) has launched a $23 million program to reduce harmful vehicle emissions in four New York City boroughs. The PowerNow! program includes $6 million in funding for the installation of pollution-control systems on 1,000 city school buses. “School buses carry our most precious resource, our children, and today we announce the nation’s largest program to reduce school bus emissions, ensuring that another resource, our air, will be cleaner and purer for our youngest citizens and all of us,” said Joseph Seymour, chairman and chief executive officer of the NYPA. The program was designed to offset air emissions generated by NYPA’s 10 small natural gas-fired turbines at sites in four boroughs. Included in the program is the installation of eight non-polluting fuel cells at New York City wastewater treatment plants, in addition to other emissions-reduction efforts. The school buses participating in the project will be equipped with a diesel particulate filter, a device containing a regenerative catalyst and a filter that is installed on the vehicle in place of the muffler. The filters, in combination with engine adjustments and the use of ultra-low sulfur diesel, reduce emission levels of particulates, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides and total hydrocarbons. As an added benefit, the buses will also run more quietly. New York is the first state in the nation to use this technology for a large fleet of school buses.