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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAir Quality Advisory Board - Minutes - 07/15/2004MINUTES CITY OF FORT COLLINS AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD REGULAR MEETING 281 N. COLLEGE AVE. July 15, 2004 For Reference: Linda Stanley, Chair 493-7225 Eric Hamrick, Council Liaison 226-4824 Lucinda Smith, Staff Liaison 224-6085 Board Members Present John Long, Ken Moore, Linda Stanley, Cherie Trine, Katie Walters, Nancy York Board Members Absent Everett Bacon, Jim Dennison, Mandar Sunthankar Staff Present Natural Resources Department: Lucinda Smith, Liz Skelton Operation Services: Tracy Ochsner, Ken Maranon Building and Zoning Felix Lee Guests Blake Wasltco, Dale Adamey The meeting was called to order at 5:39 p.m. Minutes With the following changes, the minutes of the June 08, 2004 meeting were unanimously approved: • York: (Page 1, West Nile Virus, First Bullet) Change to: The task force will be reconvening on next Thursday. • York: (Page 1, West Nile Virus, Third Bullet, First Sentence) Change to: We were going to do applying of larvicide, but we don't have the money. • York: (Page 5, Air Quality Policies, Twelfth Bullet, Second Sentence) Change to: It is true that I didn't compare this policy/plan to previous plans and really evaluate that. • York: (Page 12, Agenda Planning, Twelfth Bullet, First Sentence) Change to: They approved transit with their 1 million dollars because they couldn't put it in to roads. Municipal Government's Fleet Summary Tracy Ochsner presented on the City of Fort Collins' fleet vehicle inventory with regards to the different alternative vehicles used, and the proposed future for the composition of the fleet vehicle inventory. Mr. Ochsner supplied a handout to go along with his presentation. • York: Will you be talking about hydrogen? • Ochsner: A little bit. • York: I've heard some negative things about hydrogen. • Moore: Like the cost to produce it? • Ochsner: Yes, the cost to produce it is exceptionally high. Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 2 of 10 • York: That the fuel cells require platinum and that a nuclear power plant is being constructed and the justification is to provide hydrogen. • Ochsner: I wouldn't be able to comment on that. • York: And something about that hydrogen has to be clean before it's burnable. • Ochsner: There are some quality issues. I'm going to cover some of that; maybe not at a real technical level. • York: Is the reason you use 20% biodiesel the cost? • Ochsner: There are a couple of reasons. One reason is because if you use any more of a blend some of the engine manufacturers are saying you may have to do more engine modifications. You also have a cold weather issue. Especially on the vegetable oil, you have what they call clouding. The more you use the more chance you have of clouding. • Moore: Is the vegetable oil as volatile as the regular diesel? • Ochsner: There is some controversy on that. The blenders are saying that the vegetable oil is good to 20 degrees below. In the real world application, they're saying that's not true. There is one plant that is getting going in Berthoud. They have contracts with all the McDonalds and Burger King. They are using the vegetable oil. Their goal is to get biodiesel to a competitive price with regular diesel. The other company, BlueSun, they have not produced biodiesel yet but they are brokering it. They just opened up a pump in Fort Collins last Friday at Poudre Valley Co-op. Their plan is to start producing — when that will happen I don't know. • Stanley: We don't use any of it yet? • Ochsner: We don't use any. • Stanley: We could use it in the TransFort buses? • Ochsner: That would be a perfect market for us because not only do you have the high mileage/high usage fuel, but they also have a container that you could isolate and just put biodiesel in. • Marmon: We did run some biodiesel testing. • Ochsner: We did, with the shuttles at Riverfest. B1ueSun donated some biodiesel and we ran it in the buses and shuttles with no problems. • Mannon: Our biggest drawback right now is the 20-30 cents a gallon addition. We were just about ready to go in and do biodiesel and at about that time the cost of fuel increased. We're already spending over what we budgeted for 2004 on fuel on a cost per gallon. It's hurting us overall on the cost for fuel right now. Otherwise, we probably would be trying to sell this project to Transportation. • Stanley: If you consider all the external costs in terms of pollution, prevention, and so on, it would be a relatively easy way to get some improvements in air quality that wouldn't be all that expensive either. The City would bear all costs for it but, it just seems like an easy way to do it when we're always struggling to try to figure out how to help the pollution. Here's one way to make a little bit of a difference. • Moore: Have you run them long enough to see any maintenance benefits? • Ochsner: No we haven't. They are claiming there is possibly an extended engine life. I think that data is a bit incomplete right now. • York: I heard the oil is cleaner in the vehicle. • Marmon: I have not heard that before. • Moore: What size in particulate matter do they measure? Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 3 of 10 • Ochsner: That's a good question. I will have to get back to you on that one. • Moore: The particulate matter size... If you decrease the big rocks, that's one thing. But if the small rocks didn't decrease, or increase... • Smith: On this B1ueSun printout, the benefits are referring to PM10. • Stanley (Re: Natural gas): You are comparing that to gasoline per gallon and saying that is a lot cheaper? • Ochsner: What you'll find is it is very close to what we were paying a few weeks ago. That per gallon price does not include taxes. • Moore: Can you elaborate on that engine modification? • Ochsner: You know on the natural gas and propane conversion; where they put on a box to fool the OBD-II computer into thinking that the oxygen sensor is working correctly. • Marmon: It is so clean that it doesn't sense and then it trips. What it does is it tries to adjust. They come up with a mechanism to go in there and fool it ... that's all it is. • Walters (Re: Alternative fuel station): What are you going to use, ethelyne-glycol? • Ochsner: For the dryer itself? • Walters: Yes. • Ochsner: I don't remember the chemical that is in that. It is a desiccant that we run heat through the desiccant to dry that out. If we didn't do that it would be a maintenance nightmare. You would have to haul that off as a hazardous waste. • Moore: Is it like the silica beads? • Ochsner: I'm not familiar with those filters. From everyone we've spoken to, this technology (heat regeneration) is the way to go. Another component is the storage tubes; at other natural gas stations those are the huge things that look like missiles. We won't be buying those. • York: Does the Electrolyzer use electricity? • Ochsner: Both electricity and water. It separates the hydrogen out of the water and then it reuses that water until it is just oxygen. In theory, this Electrolyzer should have no water waste. Originally, we were looking at a 55 gallon drum per day of water and wondering what to do with that. They have come up with the technology to reuse that water and have no water waste. • York: But it uses electricity to power? • Ochsner: Yes. • York: Do you clean the water before it goes in? • Ochsner: No, it's tap water. • York: Does hydrogen have to be super clean? • Ochsner: I think if it's separated hydrogen molecules, there is nothing else there. • Moore: Unless they were talking about the pumps that were involved in pressurizing the hydrogen. Maybe there can be an oil residue. • Mannon: There are a number of ways to making hydrogen. This one doesn't produce the off -wash gallon -age. • Ochsner: We get 5-7 gallons a day of usable hydrogen. • York: The amount of energy going in and the amount of energy going out, how does that equate? • Marmon: It's pretty expensive. The hydrogen is about $4 per gallon, figuring all the energy used to produce it. Our intent was just to do natural gas, but they approached us Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 4 of 10 on this hydrogen project. The nice thing is we're not paying for any of the hydrogen equipment. For a test bed, and the opportunity to be able to produce straight hydrogen, this is a great way to get in the market and see what it can do. That one station does three different fuels. The total dollars for this thing is $886,000. We've been able to acquire grant dollars to do it. • Ochsner: The Office of Energy Management gave us the hydrogen dollars. And then we have our City matches. • York: Any possibility of using solar to help generate electricity, or that would add another layer of cost? • Mannon: We're actually using wind power. We went another step on that. We're using every mechanism possible to make this easier. • York: Wind power from..? • Marmon: Our wind farm. • Long: Are there any disadvantages to Hythane ; like with CNG, there is less range? • Marmon: With today's equipment, with CNG we don't lose any range. It is borderline, depending on the vehicle. Factory equipment today performs as well if not better than gasoline. • Long: I've always liked the performance. The van I drove was 5 years old and it got 200 miles to a full tank for a big 12 passenger van. • Mannon: The thing is, when you go back and look at this is the gallons. They're not holding as many gallons. Typically on a 15 passenger van, you've got a 31 gallon tank. If you put CNG on it, you can only put so many tanks... • Long: There is only so much room. • Ochsner: On average, you're getting 15-18 gallons on a 15 passenger van or big truck. You don't have the capacity. • Mannon: The fuel economy is similar; but the capacity is different. • Long: How does Hythane compare on range? • Ochsner: There was talk of a slight decrease. That's one of the things they're looking for on the run on the test vehicle; we don't know in the long run yet. • Long: What is the price on Ford fuel cell vehicle? • Ochsner: About $100,000. • Moore: Do you know what the maintenance cost is with those (Hybrids)? • Mannon: There is very little maintenance. • Moore: Do you know what the term is for the oil change? • Ochsner: We are keeping it the same, at 6000 miles. • Mannon: We had trouble up front with those; you have to be careful with the octane. They're recommending premium. We're running 85 out of our tanks, but it's real sensitive. • Long (Re: ULEV Vehicles): You're sure they're not something else (than electric)? • Ochsner: I don't think so. You go through the guide... they have the engine size at 6 gallons. Here again, the critical factor is the support from the manufacturers. • Long: That's strange. • Long: Have you thought about electric? They're quick. But the problem is they have no range. Maybe electric with an onboard charging mechanism? Like a generator? Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 5 of 10 • Marmon: One thing we looked at 2 years ago was hybrid buses. It would be a natural- gas -powered -generating -electric bus. The problem is they're high priced. The manufacturers are backing off that to look at other alternatives. • Long: I had a question for the whole decision -making for Fleets in general, when you look at the options of buying new vehicles. The thing is we're buying a printer right now. You have printers that are cheaper and faster, but the cartridges are expensive; they have a "cost per copy". Is there a "cost per mile" type of cost? • Mannon: We look at life cycle cost. What I want to know is what that vehicle is going to cost me from the time I buy it till the time I sell it. I look at purchase price, I look at resale price and I look at what I put into it for fuel and maintenance. When we look at some vehicle specs we do have a cost per mile tabulation. Dodge might come in cheaper, but the fuel economy is not as good. • Ochsner: John, I had a biodiesel question earlier on particulate size. • Long: Usually it's PM10. That's the size that is easily breathed in and breathed not out. The ones that are most concern for respiratory problems. IRC The information previously received on the IRC was recently reevaluated for the energy savings. The old energy saving were found to be overestimated. • Trine: Why was it too high before? • Lee: I didn't have the opportunity to go into a lot of detail. I used data from the energy study that Utilities did a few years back and some information from various builders doing high performance and what they experienced in savings. The energy code that is being proposed is not quite at that level of high performing homes; but it has some features. I estimated about half of those savings. • Trine: Why will homes that will be built not be at that quality? • Lee: Because, they don't have all features of a high quality home. The high performance home project that Utilities has spearheaded is a voluntary discussion. One aspect of improving energy performance is through codes. At this point in time it is not the only way. To make a leap from this code to that code is a considerable expense. This is an interim step between what is being now constructed and the idealized high performance home. One of the key things it acknowledges is lessons learned from poor HVAC design and poor performing duct work. It doesn't look like it in the numbers but it certainly is in comfort and safety. • Stanley: Was that one of the biggest things they found that was not being done when they did that energy evaluation? • Lee: It was the single most obvious culprit on home construction. It's really about the state of affairs of current construction. Or past construction I should say; this was 1996-1999 that these homes were studied. • Stanley: From what I understand of the folks that are now building the high performance; they get a lot fewer call backs and criticism from people complaining about the comfort level of their home. It's not quantified in the numbers, but it is important. Ultimately, it is important in the price of homes. • Trine (Re: Seasonal efficiency rating): You went from 10-12; how high does it go? • Lee: It goes to 13 and beyond that is more exotic and quite pricey. Twelve seemed reasonable. They are ready available, but they cost slightly more. Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 6 of 10 • Trine: Does it cost more for 13? • Lee: Probably, marginally. • Stanley (Re: IRC increase to housing cost): If you had to give your best guess what would it be? • Lee: I would think it would be more like $7,000-$8,000. From the last time we met, significant world events have changed some things. The price of steel and sheeting has jumped. Construction costs nation-wide overall have increased. So that's why I put it at a higher rate. • Stanley: Nothing has really changed from what we recommended before except for the energy savings has been recalculated. Everything else is the same. We recommended unanimous approval of the IRC. We considered radon and IRC separate at first and then together, but it was always recommending approval. Do you guys want to talk about re-evaluating? I feel strong about energy code; I would like to go to Council and speak if you think that's appropriate. Ken Moore made the following motion: I move we reaffirm our previous position of approval for the IRC code to Council. The motion was seconded by York. • York: Why are the two charts different? • Lee: I had some last minute changes. Consider the older one trash. • Trine: Are Council members concerned with the money up front and little savings? • Lee: I'm sure that will be brought up. The HBA is on record as opposing this. This will add some fuel to that argument. • Trine: I'm concerned it about weakening it. Your numbers may be accurate. It is confusing; all these numbers. • Lee: It is. I hope to wade through it best I can. • York: A good way to approach this is to assess the political and resource realities. The resources — we're having fewer of them. They will always be more expensive, especially energy. Natural gas, didn't it go up 72 cents. • Trine: Here is the angle I am wondering: you have a 40-year-old house and you replace a 40-year-old furnace; how much does that cost? All the duct work that was crappy that had to be replaced ... do those costs go into this? The cost of crappy workmanship. • Lee: That's hard to quantify. I've veered off of that because it just invites arguments. I can only refer to the study that was done and the problems that were associated with that. • York: I would encourage you to talk about inflation. Inflation is an ongoing process. • Stanley: The increases in prices are going to become more and more significant. I do think there is some data that shows that. Talk about safety, talk about comfort, and talk about the peak load piece with Utilities. • Trine: I think that would be the best piece — the major fear of overload. • Lee: From a community -wide, global perspective; that is significant. • Trine: Peak overload leads to chaos, crime, death in the street. This could be the next major crisis of our City. And now we have no emergency fund because we're using it to spray. • York: Linda, what are your points? Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 7 of 10 • Stanley: It supports the energy supply policy (the peak demand reduction) and the greenhouse gasses. • Trine: Marty might care about the peak overload. • Lee: It's a long-term thing. This is houses that will be built from now on. • York: And citizen's comfort. • Lee: The Affordable Housing Board withdrew their support of the radon system. They still support the energy code. They are recommending only a sub -slab preparation; very minimal. • Trine: Who is doing this, do you know? • Lee: I don't know. I have no names and addresses. • Smith: You can get on the website. It's on the City's site if you search under boards and look under Affordable Housing board. • Lee: There is another Affordable Housing Coalition. I don't think they were involved in that decision. • York: Do we know what the cost of lung cancer? • Lee: That's documented in the presentation, for radon. The documentation is from Poudre Health District and a National effort. The motion unanimously passed. • Stanley: In terms of the radon, I personally would just like to speak on the energy code. I would appreciate it if somebody else would speak for the board on radon. • Walters: I will be out of town. Nancy? • York: I'm the usual suspect. • Trine: Me too. • Stanley: Ken? • Moore: I don't speak well • York: You may be plain spoken, but that's the best thing there is. Please? • Stanley: I could ask Jim or Mandar. • Smith: Jim would be good with his health background. • Moore: I just worked with the stuff years ago. • York: You have some strong feelings too. • Lee: Any questions? • Lee: Different standards for those with less disposable incomes. • Stanley: Well that's the thing: for people who can afford the systems and know about it, a lot of the upper-class builders put them in already. • Walters: That's the problem, it's a public health issue and I don't think a lot of people see it that way. It's really hard to get people to. It's like smoking; you can't do an autopsy and say "this person died from radon". • Stanley: Will that woman be there? • Lee: Jan Johnson, no I don't think so. Air Quality Plan Lucinda Smith updated the board on the recent happenings regarding the Air Quality Plan. • Walters: Are those...? • Smith: Fort Collins Zip codes. Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 8 of 10 • Walters: The # sign is just pounds? • Smith: Yes. • York (Re: Health professionals meeting): It is great to hear that you're having that meeting. It is also an educational meeting. • Smith: It will really start forming relationships where we can talk more with them about any other things that come up. It is not a task force, this group will not convene again but it will start establishing relationships. We're going to look for opportunities where we can advance their message. One idea is that our website could advertise the Parents with Asthmatic Kids events. • York: I just read something; the American Heart Association took money, like $4 million dollars, from Subway to give their stamp of approval. • Stanley: It is interesting that the Transportation Board spoke about the diesel aspect. We have talked about a diesel task force. Maybe there is a way to do something joint with the Transportation board. We could always call our own if we wanted to. Maybe that's something to put on the next agenda. We talked about having a diesel task force but it was taken out of the Air Quality Plan because you were going to do ... prioritization of air toxics? • Smith: An assessment of the air toxics issues. Brian has learned more about the EPA's "CARE" — Community Action for Renewed Environment. The concept is what works outside the regulatory arena. The get a task force of stakeholders, they compile all the information, and it's like the community is speaking about what are the issues they want to address and how can they address them. I still believe that diesel will come up as the issue. I like the idea of having the community involvement and I think that would go a lot farther with Council too. I'm in the process of working with Brian to put together a proposal for that. Maybe in the next three months we can have something that the board can weigh in. Also, like you said, the board could also be involved with that or do something else. To me, it makes some sense to get wider consensus that diesel is the issue to work on. • Trine: You're taking out the regulatory aspect? • Smith: I believe that based on the emissions levels of air toxics here, we're not going to have other regulations that come into effect (other than toxics regulations that already exist, under Title V). But the end result of a stakeholder process could be regulatory. It could be the stakeholder group could recommend some things that would involve Council. But this will be out of the Federal Government regulatory arena. I don't think we have that level of air toxic problems here. The whole EPA approach is coming from the perspective of social justice issues. I like that aspect of their approach. • Stanley: It'd be interesting to see if all of our school buses went biodiesel; what affect that would have. During the school year they must be a fairly large contributor. • Smith: That was one of the Transportation board's questions is "what is the split in heavy duty diesel vehicle VMT in Fort Collins between buses and trucks". The State will know that. • York: That might be another group to invite; somebody from the Poudre School District. There was a study talking about the health hazards to children. • Trine: They have health board. • Smith: They do? That's a good idea. Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 9 of 10 Ozone Update Lucinda Smith brought the recent ozone -high -alert days to the board's attention and also updated the board on current outreach efforts. • Walters (Re: Modified Ozone & I/M Report): Is that just evaluating how it is going to affect ozone formation. • Smith: Yes, but other data will come out of it that is useful to us. Like, for the modified program, also what benefits will that have on CO, on hydrocarbon...? So they're not just looking at ozone. • Trine: Are there hot spots for ozone? • Smith: Probably out along the foothills. Typically that is where the higher concentrations tended to show up in Denver; generally West. hi 2005, there will be a second monitor installed, hopefully at CSU Atmospheric Science in conjunction with Anheuser Busch's expansion and the necessary monitoring associated with that. • York: Anheuser Busch is expanding? • Smith: I think they are. They may even be doing it now. I don't know the details. • Walters: What is the monitor associated with? • Smith: I think it is compliance monitoring for their permit to prove that their added capacity doesn't affect the ambient air pollutants. It's not permanent. • Walters: I just know their history. They could be doing more than they are. • Smith: hi terns of reducing emissions? • Walters: Yes. They do things that don't make sense. There was the whole issue last year with their environment officer forging documents. They got rid of him and his boss. I think they're moving in the right direction. I will just have to look into that when I go to work West Nile Update • York: The last meeting we talked about the triggers. It is .75 - infected mosquitoes - .75 is the ratio. It is the ratio of infected mosquitoes to all mosquitoes in the trap. • Stanley: So 75% have to be infected? Or .75%? • York: It's in the paper. I didn't get any percentages out of it. • Smith: The calculation is a little more complicated. You divide the average number of Culex females per trap times the infection rate, divided by 1000. It is an average; not really a percentage. • Walters: Kind of like parts per million? • Smith: Yes. Like a density. • Trine: I might be misunderstanding this; I read a CDC document and in there they talked about triggers and that a threat had to be increasing, always. This static thing happens and boom! Whereas the CDC had more of an over -time approach instead of a freak out and spray immediately approach. • Walters: It may also speak to how much you can spray. If it hits the trigger and you spray, and you monitor it and it is still working up, then you spray again. • Stanley: I thought there was a series of triggers? • York: There are other triggers. If one person dies then they spray too. • Smith: I think our City considered all of those triggers, but the only one adopted was the .75 trigger. • Stanley: The City is spraying on Monday? Air Quality Advisory Board 7/15/2004 Page 10 of 10 • Walters: Larvaciding is what I read. • York: We have six zones and they are spraying by zone. Dr. Chet Moore was going to work with a graduate student. They have 45 traps and they are trying to narrow the spray to the area around where the increase happens. • Trine: What happens if you only have 4 mosquitoes in that trap? How is that threat increasing? You need to make sure it's not an isolated event. • York: There is reason that takes place too. Its not just 4 mosquito and 2 infected equals spraying. There is a big effort to be reasonable. • Trine: Aren't the first cases in Loveland? I'm concerned it will make people sicker. • Walters: We don't know the human effects yet. They haven't connected any larvicide problems with human environmental effects. • Stanley: Our numbers of mosquitoes are way down compared to Loveland. • Trine: I'm getting on the chemical sensitivity list. You need a doctor's note. It will keep them from spraying. • York: You can call to be on list to be notified. I don't know that I have sensitivity to it. • Stanley: There are studies on pesticides and mood swings. They are finding correlations. • Trine: I asked the City for all of the studies on the efficacies of adulticiding. The CDC is using Fort Collins as their proof of efficacy. They took the number of cases before and after spraying. • Stanley: The difference was not statistically significant. • Trine: They should compare Loveland and Fort Collins. • Stanley: The level of significance was really bad. • Trine: New symptoms are appearing, like flaccid paralysis. When I read the CDC document I noticed meningitis which is a serious symptom and less than 1% get, that there are so many sources for it that the CDC won't confirm West Nile is the source. • Stanley: West Nile is mutating quite a bit. It might be better to get it now. We might have more strains later. Meeting adjourned 8:07 PM Submitted by Liz Skelton Administrative Secretary I /ipxp/eci tha. bcurdm $1i9k4 4 C91,