HomeMy WebLinkAboutAir Quality Advisory Board - Minutes - 08/23/2005MINUTES
CITY OF FORT COLLINS
AIR QUALITY ADVISORY BOARD
REGULAR MEETING
281 N. COLLEGE AVE.
August 23, 2005
For Reference: Eric Levine, Chair 493-6341
David Roy, Council Liaison 407-7393
Lucinda Smith, Staff Liaison 224-6085
Board Members Present
Kip Carrico, Dave Dietrich, Eric Levine, Bruce Macdonald, Gregory McMaster, Linda Stanley,
Nancy York
Board Members Absent
Cherie Trine
Staff Present
Natural Resources Department: Lucinda Smith, Liz Skelton
Guests
None
The meeting was called to order at 5:28 p.m.
Minutes
With the following changes, the minutes of the July 28, 2005 meeting were unanimously
approved:
York: (Page 4, 9th Bullet, Possible Consolidation of AQAB and NRAB): in Ken
Moore's first sentence, change "fist" to "first".
Public Comment
There were no public comments at this meeting.
Multi -jurisdictional I/M Transition Committee Update
Lucinda Smith presented an update to the board and provided some background information
for the newest members.
• Levine: Lucinda, are you a member of this committee; have you participated?
• Smith: Yes.
• Levine: What has state provided to this?
• Smith: A lot, actually.
• Levine: They have?
• Smith: A surprising amount, really. Primarily, an analysis of the benefit of an on -board
diagnostics program, in the basic program -area and they've provided staff support.
There have been times unfortunately when there were more State staff people there than
committee members. They've had Frank Johnson from the Attorney General's Office
come to answer questions. They did not view this committee as theirs. They wanted
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the initiative and leadership to come from the other member governments that
requested this.
• Levine: OK, thank you.
• McMaster (re: Committee supporting voluntary activities only): Why do they feel it is
not the right time to go before the Air Quality Control Commission and request work
on formation of a mandatory program?
• Smith: For several reasons. The first is that although we had higher ozone issues this
year than last year, the whole region is still on track for making attainment of ozone.
There's not a major red flag that occurred this year with the ozone levels. I think that's
one of the major reasons. And I say "they" because during three of the meetings I
unfortunately wasn't able to go, so I missed those conversations. I think there is also a
sense that the political feasibility of achieving a mandatory program at state level is
low. We'll talk a little bit about the logistical and technical obstacles with mandatory
programs.
• Levine: So the only red flag that they are looking at then is Federal regulatory
noncompliance?
• Smith: That's true. We all know that Fort Collins and other organizations have loftier
goals. To actually go to the Commission and consider going to the Legislature is not
something that you do without really being able to justify why.
• McMaster: I can understand the whole political logistic aspects. As I was reading the
document, it suggests because they didn't expect violations in 2005 with the program in
place — how did the reasoning then transfer that you stop the program?
• Smith: All the ozone modeling was done without the presence of a basic emissions
program. It was considered -out even before it was actually — it hasn't been terminated
yet but it will be terminated. But all the modeling was done under the assumption that
it would be terminated. To briefly touch on that, the ozone modeling that supported the
Action Plan was able to demonstrate attainment of the region by 2007, which is a goal.
It didn't do it in the most robust way. They had to use a slightly less robust way of
demonstrating attainment. If there were major flaws anywhere or if we had some really
bad ozone seasons, we could run into problems. That's one of the reasons that the
communities (City of Fort Collins, Larimer County, City of Greeley, North Front
Range MPO and more recently the Pike's Peak MPO) have all been concerned about
this issue and why we participated in the ozone hearing and were concerned about
termination of the emissions testing program and asked for all these additional things
from the State. So, I guess that's the quick answer: it was never factored in to the
modeling.
• McMaster (re: two -speed idle test benefits on carbon monoxide and VOCs in 2005-
2007): Is that a reduction in total CO emissions?
• Smith: Yes, I'm pretty sure that was total emissions, not only mobile -source CO. I
should double-check.
• Levine (re: Commission allowing the program to go on for one more year): Wasn't
there a technicality to do with the City of Greeley that influenced their opinion to keep
the program another year?
• Smith: I'm not sure what you're referring to. I know the City of Greeley did a phone
survey that asked the same question that we did about keeping the program and they
also received 62% in favor.
• Levine: I thought it was a legal technicality.
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• Smith: Oh, right, I remember. The I/M program was still in Greeley's SIP; it had not
been removed from their SIP so they had to do some stalling to get the timing to work
out. But they did resolve that issue. They will have modified Greeley's State
Implementation Plan for CO so that the emissions program is removed from the SIP
before the program is terminated. And that would have happened even if it had
terminated at the end of 2005. I think that was the issue.
• Levine: Yes.
• Levine (re: Strategy (out of nine) for anti -idling program): The Denver anti -idling
ordinance is temperature based? But only in the direction of cold temperatures?
• Smith: Yes. But it's fairly long — 10 minutes.
• York (re: Strategy (out of nine) for Stage I vapor recovery & enforcement): Couldn't
you also just observe it too? When a tank comes up to fill the gas station tanks they
probably don't just fill one.
• Smith: They say refueling happens most often at night. The drivers try to come at night
so they don't have to deal with traffic. I think there has to be someone in attendance at
the station and to sign off on the delivery so we were thinking that if we just let the
station attendants know to check on whether the system being used or not — that could
be a good start.
• Levine: And if it is, the possible benefits could be much more than ozone or
hydrocarbon reduction. Major components of gasoline (especially high octane, which
can be 40% or more) are compounds of BTX. That is benzene, toluene, xylene and
ethylene.
• Stanley: Can we tell just by looking? I was at the gas station the other day while they
were filling up and I didn't know how to tell.
• Smith: I think you should see hoses attached at all ends. There should be a hose going
from the tanker to the ground, and another hose going from the ground to the tanker.
That's how the enforcement people said that we can tell.
• Levine: Benzene is a proven carcinogen. I don't believe the US government recognizes
toluene as a carcinogenic, but Italy does. It is suspected to be a carcinogenic. I don't
know about xylene and ethylene but I would think that they may be as well.
• Macdonald: They're all listed hazardous air pollutants.
• Smith: Right, more than anything it's really a safety concern.
• Dietrich: Why are they bypassing it?
• Smith: The concept about why is that it might be faster because they wouldn't have to
spend maybe 5 minutes or less hooking up the extra hose. I've also heard that they
download the fumes back at refinery and weigh it. If there were no fumes in the tank
there would be a discrepancy there and a violation. Everything does not add up yet. I
don't think we have all the information.
• Stanley (re: Strategy (out of nine) for reducing fuel volatility): What would be a non -
lower RVP amount?
• Smith: It used to be that the region was allowed to have 9 (pounds per square inch). I
don't know what the actual measurement was; it was probably just below 9 for the clear
gas. An ironic thing is that there is still that 1-pound waiver for ethanol which has
mixed benefits; that has stayed in the regulation. The ethanol waiver is still in there and
our fuel is still a little more volatile than it is in other areas of the country.
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• Stanley (re: Strategy (out of nine) for Local Smoking Vehicle Programs) What percent
of the air pollutants are attributed to smoking vehicles?
• Smith: I don't know that. They comprise 1 % of the fleet.
• Macdonald: I've heard it is quite a large percentage.
• McMaster: So even if you don't live in Fort Collins — even if you are just passing
through the City limits?
• Smith: Yes. If the car is registered in Colorado you get a letter, but it could be enforced
regardless of where the car is registered. It is in the traffic code.
• York: But is has to be observed by an enforcer?
• Smith: Right.
• Levine: We need to all be aware that most of the vehicles that have catastrophic failures
of major anti -air pollution components do not necessarily produce clouds and smoke.
So when we say that maybe half of pollution is produced by 5% of the vehicles, most
are not producing visible smoke. Usually blue smoke is produced by engines that are
wom out.
• York: What components are you talking about? Are you talking about malfunctioning?
• Levine: Sometimes components are deliberately disconnected. But, catastrophic
failures of the air pollution control systems can also happen. If all of those had clouds
of blue smoke every time the system would fail, we wouldn't need on -board
diagnostics.
• York: Would those vehicles be picked up by that remote sensor?
• Smith: If they had high CO or hydrocarbons, yes. I guess it is possible, but it doesn't
do an opacity reading; it doesn't look for smoke. This assessment (of the Multi -
Jurisdictional I/m Committee) is to evaluate strategies for use after the emission
program goes away. When the program terminates, the remote sensor will go away too
(the C1eanScreen program). Don Stedman's SmartSign down on Spear Blvd will still
be there, but that is not in Fort Collins. The other thing that will go away is the
emissions program check for visible smoke. That was one cause for failure. There will
be no check.
• York (re: Strategy (out of nine) for a mandatory high emitter program & false failures
problem): I was astonished in reading this that only 35% of the records were usable.
• Smith: All the rest weren't false failures — I think that happened at a much larger level
of data processing. It's on page 9. They weren't able to read or match -up the license
plate or they didn't have all the valid parameters in place. Now they've upped it to two
valid hits, not just one, which will make a big difference. There were several criteria
for evaluating data. All those things have to be true in order for it to be considered a
valid record.
• Levine (re On -board diagnostics as either a standalone or in addition to a tailpipe
testing program): Do large trucks have OBD2?
• Smith: I think so. I'm not sure.
• Levine: It said light vehicles. Those monster pickup trucks we see everywhere — it
seems to be every third vehicle I town these days.
• Smith: Those would. If it's a regular pickup truck, even if they are huge, it would have
OBD2. We're not talking about large, heavy -gross vehicle weight diesel trucks, right?
• Levine: Right.
• Smith: If it's a regular pickup truck, yes they would have it.
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• York (re: Strategy for modifications to the existing program but could be done
separately — Gas Cap Pressure Test): Have you found a lot of gas cap failures?
• Smith: Not as much as I thought. It was about 6%-7%, but I was expecting 10-17%
based on Denver's experience with the program.
• Levine (re: Board feedback): My first question is did any entity on the committee favor
or recommend any kind of mandatory program?
• Smith: No. None of them were in favor of recommending any mandatory program
now.
• Levine: Right, so they don't favor any kind of mandatory replacement for it?
• Smith: That's my sense. I can honestly say that people feel that it is a losing battle right
now.
• Macdonald: A losing battle to extend the program?
• Smith: No. To just achieve some other statewide mandatory program. If we were in
dire straits with ozone or something else, then maybe. But otherwise, no.
• York: It made me feel like it was a losing battle when I read this report. I liked the idea
of having an initial pilot program to determine the initial effectiveness. That could be
the OBD2 program. I think some people, when their check engine light comes on they
just brush it off. If there was a free program where they could go and have it read, I'm
sure some people would do it out of self interest.
• Stanley: Who is going to do this? Pikes Peak?
• Smith: They are going to try.
• Stanley: When does that happen?
• Smith: Their applications and funding cycle would have to be put together in
September for 2007 funding. They put in the application and then they probably learn
in early 2006 if it was funded in 2007. So it's still a ways out there.
• Stanley: But at least somebody is trying it so we can get some information.
• Smith: One of the challenges I see about that is it focuses on newer vehicles. It's true
that newer vehicles can fail, but proportionately most of the higher emitters are
probably older vehicles.
• Stanley: What age of vehicles are we talking about?
• Smith: 1996 and newer or 2000 and newer. I think some states are moving up the years
where they are considering OBD because of the problems in the early vehicles. The
systems weren't fully designed.
• Levine: When all of those projections of the efficacy of OBD2 and our basic I/M
program — which I'm very skeptical of, they could be accurate but I'm very skeptical
because I've seen numbers change according to the politics; great large changes — but I
would think that the efficacy, the accuracy of that is based on vehicle maintenance, how
consumers maintain their vehicles, and also how the fleet mix changes over time. Both
of those are human behaviors that are influenced by economics. Economics in the state
have changed greatly over the last couple of years and I would think therefore that
those behaviors could change and therefore the outcomes would change.
• Smith: That could be. I know they are periodically updating the model to address those
human behavioral patterns: driving patterns, maintenance patterns...
• Levine: Vehicle purchases as well.
• Smith: I do know that the modeling that was done was using the best, most current
assumptions that are used across the board. At least it is an apples -to -apples
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comparison. But you're right, it could change. I would think if gas prices are going to
go up it might actually be more incentive to keep vehicles repaired.
• MacDonald: Can you describe a little bit more what the 2006 High Emitter Program
that you have planned here is?
• Smith: It actually does two things. The bulk of it is a small-scale test of high emitter
program. We would have the remote sensing device at different locations in Fort
Collins, we'd get the data and use the same analysis that Denver is using and we would
use the same high cut points for carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons and identify high
emitters by license plate and then contact them and invite them to come and have a
confirmatory test which would be a mass emissions test at CSU. If it is confirmed high
and was not a false failure by the remote sensing, we would offer them up to $500
worth of repairs, repair the vehicle, find out what the problem was, survey them, pull
the OBD2 codes and just gather all that data. It is a very small scale test. We only
have enough funding to repair 25 vehicles. They are talking about 500 vehicles in
Denver. It would give some information about the ability of the remote sensor to
perform for high -emitter identification in Fort Collins. Do we have the adequate sites?
Site selection is an important element. How does the public here respond versus in
Denver? There are some specific questions that we could answer. That's the larger
part of it. A smaller part of it is to offer reduced -cost 2-speed idle tests to people who
are considering buying a used vehicle. We wanted to explore some sort of change -of -
ownership emissions testing program because there is a consumer protection issue. We
will offer 100 reduce -priced idle tests and work through used car dealers to reach the
potential buyers. And survey them and survey the dealers and assess feasibility of
some kind of program like that. Many garages will keep their four -gas analyzer
anyway, which is the emissions -testing unit, because they use it as a diagnostic tool. So
there is the issue of quality assurance, but it might be possible to work out something
where that basic two -speed test still has value on the change -of -ownership side.
• McMaster: I don't know what the board's feelings are on an issue like this, but it seems
to me that what I would like to see coming out of a board like this and a group like this
is when we come up with a recommendation, we weigh in with our viewpoint on that.
Just as an example, the first thing up there is do we agree with the voluntary approach?
I'm not sure what people think, but even if it is not politically feasible, or they don't
want to do it doesn't mean we can't give them feedback saying "we don't think this is
going far enough and we are concerned". That could be something that they could pass
along if they were doing a report. Maybe they need to hear some of that to help both
give them support and to see that viewpoint. We had this listed as a discussion item,
but maybe it would be most effective if this board could come up with something more
concrete that could perhaps even then be passed on to City Council. Again, I don't
know what our feelings are and whether we can even pull that off logistically.
• Levine: If we're going to go in that direction, I would suggest that we allow time at our
next meeting to take that up. Maybe we could even do email exchange if people have
comments or questions. Time is short on this issue.
• McMaster: I'm almost thinking like the letter that preceded the last meeting on Chronic
Wasting Disease. We had something to respond to.
• Levine: That could be done.
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• Smith: I think there would be great value in knowing what board thinks. I just wonder
how it fits with the mission of board which is to make recommendations to City
Council, fairly specifically, and the MPO on matters of the State Implementation Plan.
• McMaster: We were one of the cities that requested that this group form. So it seems
like that would be a very legitimate...
• Levine: I believe it is well within our purview. This could be a change in the State
Implementation Plan which we recommended, if it were anything mandatory or
legislative in nature.
• Stanley: I would like to see the State and Fort Collins to do as much as possible to
improve air quality. Some of these programs I think that are possibilities for them
being mandatory — I feel like those are premature. Because for example, the mandatory
high emitter program, we don't know yet how that's going to work.
• York: In this example, it doesn't work very well.
• Stanley: The mandatory OBD2 program, I'm not sure of what the benefit would be
given the cost — in a number of different ways: not only setting up the program, but
politically, etc., because of the year of the vehicles. Because of the year that many of
the high emitter vehicles are and the fact that they don't have OBD2 systems. The
smoking vehicles — I personally would like to see that enforced more. I'm wondering if
we can't make a recommendation to City Council at the next meeting that it be
enforced. I think it's just a matter of saying `eve are going to start enforcing this
particular law'. I know there are a lot of laws right now in Fort Collins that the police
don't enforce. Is that because that there is not enough time to do that or because these
are seen as `nitpicky' and not something they want to be doing? I've actually heard
that before. That some of these laws — the leash law, vagrant laws, etc. — that those are
not something they want to be doing and that's not what police are really for. But I
think that when we enforce the laws for smaller offenses you actually get more
compliance with the larger offenses. It's a boomerang effect.
• Levine: The smoking vehicles as opposed to polluting vehicles that aren't necessarily
smoking, which I believe are in a majority, is the where most I/M programs are most
effective. Most I/M programs are effective on the cars that are pre-OBD cars. If the
vehicle is not smoking and there is no OBD, no light to go off, they don't know if their
vehicle is operating properly. But the mandatory emissions testing program was the
thing that told them.
• Stanley: But that will be gone.
• Levine: Only the smoking vehicles have an indication that the vehicle is not operating
correctly and so did all of their neighbors for about two blocks around and everyone
else. I would just tend to think that that's not the biggest problem because of all of
those signs.
• Stanley: No, but 1 think that's something that can easily be done and at a relatively low
cost. Right now the State says that we cannot have our own I/M program. Given that
we can't have that, what can we do to help our air? Just to finish up — I'm very much
for the idling campaign that's going to start this fall. I'm glad to see we're doing that
and we'll get some idea of how well that's working, what reductions that we get.
• York: It could be mandatory.
• Stanley: I'd like to see how it goes first. I think that's partially just a matter of people
knowing that it's not smart to sit out there and idle.
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• York: What I'm thinking with a mandatory law is that people pay attention to this
because people right now, they don't understand.
• Stanley: I agree; they don't. I just think that isn't feasible to pass through this Council.
I think the political capital that we spend trying to get that through this Council could
be detrimental to what we could do in the future. That would be one reason why I
would say hold off on something like that and let's do the education. And then I would
like to see that we do gather more information on the Stage 1 Vapor Recovery Systems.
At least we need to know, if nothing else.
• Levine: Lucinda, you said before that the State uses the best information we have in
some of these models. I thought the UM programs are the main means to get those
numbers. As far as what percentage of vehicles fail, how do they fail, what pollutants
do they fail on... minus the measurement that we have, we are getting rid of the way
that we even find out about those things. What is the State going to plug in? Are they
going to plug in other state's numbers, that were wise enough to continue these types of
programs, or not?
• Smith: They will be getting the data from the Denver program for a few more years.
That's not ending. But that's a good point.
• Dietrich: Do the testers have to turn in their data?
• Smith: Yes. It is on a unified database; they don't have a choice. It is managed by the
contractor
• Dietrich: Do we have a voluntary program for smoking vehicles?
• Smith: Right now it just consists of the Smoking Vehicle Hotline.
• Dietrich: Right. I've seen some communities educate their City employees who are on
the streets all the time. They would promote them to call it in and make it part of their
job responsibility.
• Smith: We could use the same employees that we had participate in the pilot.
• Dietrich: Another thing is, in all cases, education to promote better use of gasoline
which also reduces emission. We could do public service announcements. You might
see in the next few years that if gas prices go up there will be a reduction in the amount
of gas usage.
• Stanley: I wonder if you could do an article in paper on how to save gas? It doesn't
even have to be anything about air quality.
• Smith: I was just thinking when you were talking that that might be a good angle to the
campaign. I'll just say honestly, we've been talking about the idling campaign and are
concerned about how it might look to spend $16,000 on idling while there are
significant budget cuts being made. We're trying to find out what is appropriate right
now. If the focus were on reducing gas use, which would save money and also reduce
air pollution, I'm thinking that might be a much more palatable way to do it.
• Dietrich: I wonder if people know that their car idling for 10 minutes uses how much
gas? Keep their tires inflated, do this, that and the other thing.
• York: The wear and tear on the engine is also a factor that was mentioned in the draft
report. I don't know about the OBD2 program, how expensive it is or how time
consuming it is, but it seems that once you have the equipment, that you can just plug it
in and get a readout. I don't know why that has to be so expensive. Maybe their could
be an appeal to repair shops — that they do it for reduced -cost or free, then maybe they
will get some business to do the repairs.
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• Smith: I think you're right that the testing equipment is not expensive to the individual
shops, the handheld scanner, but to implement a whole program that has oversight, data
management, quality assurance and enforcement...
• York: I was thinking of a voluntary program. Or something like if my light goes on
that I could go and get it checked out at a reasonable cost or no cost.
• Dietrich: Are you thinking of a specific testing center or at any automobile entity?
• York: I was thinking that maybe shops could do it voluntary.
• Dietrich: My son's light just went on and I made the arrangements to bring it in and
they checked it out and didn't charge me anything for it.
• York: But you see — if that could be formalized so that anybody knew that if they took
their car in to get it checked it wasn't going to cost them $30.00.
• Stanley: But don't you have a regular mechanic? That's just something my regular
mechanic does.
• Dietrich: If you take it to anybody else you see, they're going to charge you what it
takes them to do it, like a half an hour labor. And unless they are compensated for that
labor through some program, why wouldn't they charge for that?
• York: If it takes a half-hour!
• Dietrich: Well, if it takes 15 minutes they'll charge you ten bucks or something.
Everybody has the right to charge what they want.
• Stanley: This is a little bit off the subject but I was just doing a write up for some folks
working on message development. One of the things we say over and over again is to
start where your audience is, start where your voters are, not where you are. Many
times when we're thinking about programs, we're starting where we are. We're
thinking about how we view these things, what we know and all of that. We don't start
where other people are. So in an idling campaign, most people don't give two whittles
about the air.
• York: No, that's not true. They give two whittles.
• Stanley: OK, they give a little bit. But they don't connect it and they also don't think
that they have much of an effect. So if you could think about where people are, where
are they coming from, what is going to motivate them.
• York: The other thing is, the $16,000 or whatever you have, if you try to maximize the
public information rather than printing up everything. Or make it a small card.
• Smith: Roughly, we were trying to get participation. So we were going to have
something that would involve tracking, where people actually write something down
and participate. So that was the reason for printing something up. But you're right; it
could be as small as possible. But just any kind of fairly -visible campaign, I think we
want to be careful about. That doesn't mean that we don't want to do it, we just have to
think about how it looks.
• York: Back to the City Council considering a mandatory ordinance, maybe the very
fact that it was even considered would alert people to it. Maybe City Council could
understand that right from the get go. This is an attention -getting ordinance, even just
the discussion, and we could have them with us instead of thinking that we want to
regulate everything.
• Smith: Could I just throw something quickly in about that? We'd like to resume this
idea that came up when we met with Poudre School District before, which is the idea of
not an ordinance, but either a unified or increased idling policy on the part of several
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large agencies (City of Fort Collins, Larimer County, Poudre School District and CSU).
Then we would have this joint announcement about idling policies at these
organizations and maybe a proclamation at City Council. It's not an ordinance, but it is
an increased focus. That is what was talked about back in May, and none of us have
come together to work on it but we still could. That idea is still out there. I don't know
what anyone thinks about that.
• Dietrich: I still really like that idea. You know, "not only are we doing it but you could
do it too by...". I still think the school bus and City trucks idea is great.
• Stanley: I would assume that there is a policy that the City trucks aren't supposed to
idle, right?
• Smith: It's very vague. It says City employees are encouraged to eliminate unnecessary
idling. TransFort has more concrete policy; it's ten minutes I think.
• York: My experience with City employees is that they blow that off.
• Smith: There's probably some awareness -raising that could happen there.
• York: Well that is what an ordinance would do. That would send a message to
everybody. I think it's worth milking that.
• Dietrich: The City and the School District are in the position where they are strapped
for money and the message could be "help us out by doing this".
• Stanley: I think first that we should do the anti -idling program and these ideas and see
how it goes.
• Levine: One thing I see that this board can do, that it has done over the years, is the
City is working on some programs that are worthwhile for sure, I think we are in
agreement with those programs, or hopefully suggestions that will turn in to programs,
we can offer support for those to Council and back those up. That would be the easiest
way to get them to look at more stringent programs and recommend a couple of those.
We could certainly make a recommendation even if it is only supporting programs that
the City is considering right now. I would suggest that we put some of that at the front
of the meeting next month.
• Macdonald: So we would be discussing recommendations?
• Levine: Yes.
• Smith: And I should have a final report of committee for the board before the next
meeting.
• Levine: And we could put out some suggestions or observations via email before then.
• Macdonald: I have about a dozen here that I will be sending. Will we get that report
early?
• Smith: September 7`h is the meeting to meet and finalize it. Then there will have to be
some editing.
• Macdonald: Will we have a draft?
• Smith: Well you have the draft. That is it.
• Levine: I have some typo corrections here — like "fat" instead of "fact".
• York: I would just encourage that you link wear and tear on the engine with the idling
program.
• Stanley: People think that turning their car off and on is wear and tear, right?
• Macdonald: And when you peel out from the intersection...
• Stanley: But that's cool.
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• Smith: I might contact you to get your ideas before that meeting so I can bring those to
the meeting.
Climate Protection Update
Lucinda Smith presented an update to the board and provided some background information
for the newest members.
• McMaster (re: recommendation to bring CO2 only 30% below the worst -case 2010
levels): Well except, just for clarification, if you trying to reduce it below the worst -
case scenario that you are not realistically expecting, most likely you will have a lower
amount and say "gee look at this great reduction".
• Stanley: I was wondering about that too.
• Levine: I've spent about a half-hour on this issue this afternoon and it is an issue that
I've been thinking about for the last ten years. I'm really glad you mentioned that. In
my opinion — and we've kind of let that slide at the time that we developed the climate
protection program because it was such a good program as far as the very wide -range of
the program, it has a complete emissions inventory, all this good stuff, and we needed
to get our foot in the door at the time. And we had our mobility report card that we
were waiting for, for years, and we finally got it and it showed 24.8% in the three years.
However, the interesting thing is the City never used those numbers for any other
projection or program that I am aware of. In other words, when it benefited the City,
the City realized that that kind of VMT is not sustainable because our roads would be a
parking lot and therefore there would be no extra VMT generated, and it is not
sustainable. So the City came up with a number which I believe is 4.9% per year. If
we use that number, which I believe constitutes a realistic worst -case scenario VMT,
then that 350,000 tons becomes 2,450.
• Macdonald: So a little nearer the 2004 level?
• Levine: Right.
• Stanley: So you don't even have to do anything. You could just say, "Huh, we are
going to meet our thing".
• Macdonald: "It's 4.9 instead of 7"
• Stanley: Yeah.
• McMaster: Just to continue this discussion, it seems to me that you want to measure
two things: you want to know total emissions and then you want to do it on a per capita.
• Levine: And the City has done both of those.
• McMaster: That's what I didn't get to see — the initial report didn't do the per capita.
• Smith: Right.
• McMaster: Do we have that information?
• Smith: We do; I'll be getting to it. I think there is a lot of validity in this discussion of
forecast vs. target. But I still think the overriding goal is to achieve actions that reduce
emissions, whatever you are comparing it to relatively. I just know that our forecast is
not accurate. It is a worst, worst -case scenario.
• York (re: Kyoto goal of 12%): By 2030?
• Smith: By 2012; that's the date by which if the United States joined we should have
met it. That's still a goal that other global organizations are considering.
• McMaster: Again though, that's a little bit problematic because they are looking at that
by country. If you have a region like us that is growing per capita...
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• Smith: Right. The growth and also the climate are very important factors. I think
personally it would be impractical without Federal mandates for Fort Collins to get
down to 1990's levels. But I think that we could be doing a lot more than we are doing.
• Levine (re: 2001 emissions reduction of 237,000 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent): If
we use around 4.9% VMT growth instead of over 7%, the entire total for 2010 is
brought down 20%. In other words, 2/3 of the reduction gain is just that one
assumption alone.
• Smith: Right. One of the measures also in the plan was to bring VMT growth rate to
population growth rate. It's sort of like you inflate it and then you deflate it.
• Levine: But that's again why I would think 4.9 should be worst case. The City's goals
are to bring the VMT rate to population rate.
• Stanley: So if you were to use 4.9% and then you forecast out to 2010, what was 30%
reduction of that?
• Levine: Around 2,700 instead of 3,500, I think.
• Stanley: OK, so then I take the 30% of that. So we're looking at reducing by .81?
• Levine: Of course that's one worst case. That probably wasn't realistic worst case.
There could be others because as Lucinda said we are looking at worst -case
assumptions. Obviously, you would hope that those would be easier to do `better -than'.
• Dietrich: Have you considered wind energy?
• Smith: Yes, wind energy is in here. There are a lot of things that I didn't mention that
are quantified.
• Stanley: On the vegetation piece, is that a reduction because there were more trees
planted?
• Smith: Which one are you looking at?
• Stanley: On the CO2... sequestration by trees.
• Smith: OK; no it wasn't because of more trees planted. That was just an estimate of the
benefit of all the trees in Fort Collins and their abilities to sequester.
• Stanley: But that's something that we're doing all along, so it's not like we are
improving in that area. That shouldn't be counted into a reduction because that should
have been in your original model, right?
• Levine: But we get credit for actions that we're taking.
• Stanley: But that's not an action that you're taking.
• Smith: Well, you're right. The way that we have been doing it, is according to the
Cities for Climate Protection protocol, which is a little different than some of the other
quantification registries. Basically you take credit for any action since 1990 because
that is where your find your baseline and then you estimate a worst -case and anything
you do since then counts. But you are right — we didn't plant those trees since 1990 and
we do take credit for them and we have all along.
• Stanley: Unless they were never put in to the original model. Then it would be OK to
take credit.
• Dietrich: Unless you plant more trees.
• Smith: Right. There is another number there one line down that is the increase in the
citywide tree planting.
• Stanley: It seems like that should be the only one counted. I'm thinking in terms of the
incremental type of analysis. It all depends on what was counted to begin with in your
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original model. If you didn't take that into account there, then would it be valid to take
it into account down here at the bottom line?
• Smith: You're right. I haven't thought about it that way. That's a good question to
think about. In the inventory, emissions from trees are not factored in, which is an
imbalance in this whole process. We honestly just followed the approach that other
communities are doing. They provide the model, which is adaptable. I can say that it
was factored into the development of our goal though. They way that the 30%
reduction target was arrived at is adding up all the measures that were existing,
pending, and identified for the future that could be reasonable. It was trying to come up
with something that was a stretch, but a reasonable stretch. So that tree benefit was in
there. It's not unimportant for the quantification, but it's kind of a mute point because
it just depends on what you are comparing it to. But I'm glad you raised that question,
I think that is an important one.
• Stanley (re: emissions factor used to determine carbon dioxide emissions due to
electricity changing to reflect the mix that Platt River Power Authority uses): There's
not a whole lot you can do about that — it's PRPA.
• York: So what's the hydro? 15%?
• Smith: It...
• Levine: The hydro component, what I remember from when the board first started
around circa 1994-1995 was maybe 30%.
• Smith: In 2004, it was 21 %.
• Levine: So actually our renewables are going down.
• York: And what was natural gas?
• Smith:3%.
• York (re: per capita emissions over time & jump from 2002-2003): Well houses are
getting bigger.
• Smith: Well, I think they were in 2002 also. That's why I don't know about that. But
clearly there is a jump from 1990. Keep in mind the years are not spaced
proportionately on the time axis.
• Carrico: As the City grows, people are moving more.
• Smith: You're right.
• Levine: Larger cars driven more miles. More errands run.
• Levine (re: Natural Gas peakers): Of course that's the most expensive; they back that
down first.
• Smith: Right.
• Levine: But we have base load and we have peak load. Isn't most of the economy in
electric at the base load and peak is a relative fraction of that?
• Smith: Right, but Paul Warila at PRPA said that they don't just run the turbines during
the peak times, although I had always thought that they did. He made a correction that
now they assume that 89% of the time they back down the peakers based on looking at
when the savings usually occur. Many of the savings do occur during peak demand
because there is a cost incentive for commercial customers (they get charged a lot for
the peak hours) so I can't say exactly how they came up with up that. This is what they
use in their official reporting. They say they back down the natural gas 89% of the
time, which is why that factor has changed.
• Levine: I'm realizing now that there are a lot of complexities that I'm not aware of.
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• Macdonald: Is there a write up that accompanies this?
• Smith: Yes, there is a whole report that accompanies this but it is still in the draft stage.
It explains a lot. That's what the Energy Management Team puts together.
• Levine: So, on the City's website they have the original Council ordinance and two of
the biannual reports?
• Smith: Correct. They all look the same but here is the most recently completed
biannual report. It talks about all the measures and is probably more detailed than
anyone would want to know.
• Stanley: On the second table, Municipal Quantifiable Measures, the last two columns
say 2001-2002. Should that be 2003-2004?
• Smith: Oh, that's a typo. Thanks.
• Levine (re: incentive -based demand -side management programs & energy savings): So,
how is that happening? It seems like the amount of air-conditioning use, which has
gotten to be one of the single largest residential uses of electricity, seems to be
increasing tremendously.
• Smith: It looks to me like the down -slope just started in 2002. This graph is from
Utilities, but you're right that it is counter to what we saw from the per capita
greenhouse gas emissions.
• Levine: Ironically, the increased use of air conditioning is probably caused by the
global climate change. Thing's have changed tremendously in the 25 years that I've
lived here. We used to have winters with -8° for the week high. That's a thing of the
past. We never had hot spells in the summers like we have had. Once people buy air
conditioners and make that investment I don't think they're likely to get rid of them.
We have a different paradigm operating now which is heating in the winter and cooling
in the summer.
• Smith: Yes. I does seem like the weather has changed.
• McMaster (re: CSU Wind Energy Program): Where do they offer it?
• Smith: Students in residence halls and on -campus apartments can choose to pay more
just like regular residential customers.
• Stanley (re: energy manger position): Was it in an offer?
• Smith: Yes. It didn't make it in the first round so it was probably revised and repacked.
I honestly don't know the status of it right now.
• Stanley: Because that pays for itself, by far and several times over.
• Smith: Right; the performance contract is nearly revenue -neutral. It doesn't require
much outlay of capital.
• Levine (re: quantification not being 100% complete): How much of this table is
complete?
• Smith: I would say 80%.
• Levine: Can we see some of the rest?
• Smith: You have everything that I have. It's only where there are zeros that it is not
complete.
• McMaster: What is the done column?
• Smith: Unless I made a mistake, it means that those are finished. Is that confusing?
• McMaster: Well, no. There is places where there are Xs and not zeros.
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• Smith: Right, for example on the TDM programs we still need to get the 2003 VanGo
data. I did this in a hurry. The numbers are as right as they can be, but the notes may
not be right.
• Stanley: I have to go, but I hope that next month we will be seeing the budget?
• Smith: Yes. The City Manager has to deliver it on Sept 6`h.
• Stanley: That will probably be the most of our meeting, I would imagine, is for us to
make recommendations on the budget. I would be very interested to see where some of
these things are.
• Smith: The good news is that Utilities has offered to fund Climatewise. I don't think
it's vulnerable to being cut and that offers some relief to the general fund
environmental result area.
• Macdonald: This table will really form the heart of your report?
• Smith: Yes.
• Levine: The grand total is 192,000.
• Smith: We could assume that it might go up 20,000-30,000 more when we fill in the
remaining numbers. We expect 20,000 more for ClimateWise and 10,000 more for
energy distribution and most of the others are pretty small. I haven't yet been able to
quantify the benefit of the carbon sequestration in the natural areas. That's an
important factor.
• Carrico: Is there any way to quantify the individual actions as far as "Joe -homeowner"?
• Smith: That shows up in the reduced energy use.
• Carrico: The downturn in per capita efficiency may be more related to the business
institutional improvements rather than residential. If you could have a ClimateWise
program for individuals or residences, or other people besides businesses. It may be
less `bang for the buck' for those but it may have some significant gains still.
• Smith: That's an interesting idea. The thing about ClimateWise is we try to track and
quantify the benefits of their actions so that would mean doing the same for citizens.
They would have to sign up and agree to do X things. We could track it on the web
pretty easily.
• Levine: The grand total is about 10% of the total CO2 emissions?
• Smith: In that ballpark.
• Levine: I've been interested in removing some of the white elephants, especially the
VMT, and do a realistic worst case, which I think is 4.9 and see how we are really
doing. I believe we're assuming that our electric policy is absolutely going to be met. 1
think that remains to be seen. These things look great in paper but they are just goals,
policy goals, and they're on paper but the commitment is not written in blood.
Assumptions that we think are true may turn out differently. I wonder if there are any
other large -ticket items that could go either way depending on your assumptions, in
terms of our goals and meeting them. VMT is such a big one and it jumps out at you.
These are great starts, but some are relatively small ticket items. Twenty of these may
not equal one large -ticket item. They are worthwhile, but to meet the goal we must
focus on the large -ticket items. Obviously VMT and electricity are the two big items.
• Smith: Or fuel -efficiency is another way to get at it.
• MacDonald: Have the hybrid -cars been figured in?
• Smith: No, you're right they haven't yet.
• Dietrich: Did we do the VMT projection with same average miles per gallon?
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• Smith: We made one adjustment half -way through that the MPG might have improved.
I can look that up.
• Dietrich: But they haven't improved yet.
• Smith: I take that back, we made a worst -case prediction so we assumed the fuel
efficiency was the same as it was in 1990.
• McMaster: Does the City track TransFort emissions? It seems to me that there has to
be a trade-off on that. Have they factored that in to some of this analysis?
• Smith: I'm not aware of the City estimating emissions from the TransFort fleet. In
terms of the overall citywide emissions forecast, we did use the VMT distribution of
different types of vehicle categories that is used by the MPO. It was about 4-5% heavy
duty diesel vehicles. We applied those estimates that the MPO uses to our VMT
numbers to come up with our forecast. It tries to guess at what types of vehicles are out
there making the VMT and then it quantifies those by type, by vehicle category.
• Levine: My interest is, I would like to have a sense of how we are doing with using
realistic worst -case assumptions that the City has used as their assumptions?
• Smith: What would think about starting that from the year 2000? What's the point of
going back to 1990 if we are talking about forecasting? I think you're asking for a
revised forecast right?
• Levine: One reason is that the City made goals and Council, Management, and staff
said these are the goals we will meet and made a commitment in terms of those specific
goals. I have no problem with doing something else, but since that is the goal that City
said they would do we have buy -in for that already and I think it is productive to look at
it in those terms.
• Smith: I was just thinking about that we really started forecasting in 1998; I guess we
could go back to 1990. It just the issue of which emissions factors should be applied
that makes it a little more complicated. But I could do a forecast to 2010 using a 4.9%
VMT growth rate.
• Levine: That's the rate that the City has used for everything except this.
• Smith: They've used lower VMT in the Transportation Plan but I think that is the
current estimate.
• Levine: If they would have used lower, 4.9 would look high.
• McMaster: I agree with more realistic worst -case estimates, but I don't like that
approach. It comes back to creating a worst -case scenario and you are comparing your
efforts to that. I agree to bring that in to line but to me we should be focused...
• Levine: I'm just looking at the buy -in. To me, this went through Council, staff,
committees, citizens and everyone has said this is our commitment. It was made within
a certain framework and if we stick to that and look at it in that framework and say are
we realistically meeting these goals or not.
• Smith: The problem is the way that we account for our progress. Under the old
scenario we've always accounted for it based on actions taken since 1990 relative to a
worst -case. Some of those assumptions might not be valid anymore. Do you know
what I mean?
• Levine: No. Do you mean the worst -case or the actions taken?
• Smith: Well... maybe it would still be applicable. I just have to think it through.
• Levine: Where I'm heading is if the City is not really meeting the commitment it made,
I would want it to.
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• McMaster: That's a good way of looking at it. Perhaps as this moves along, we can get
them thinking that that is not anywhere near adequate way of addressing the problem.
• Levine: This whole process started off with the Kyoto agreements. The industrialized
nations were going to cut below a modest 7.5% below 1990 levels and they had over
two decades to do it. And then you look at the total of the Kyoto which is 5.6% when
you add third world countries. And we are looking at well we can't achieve anything
near that. And then we are making worst -case assumptions that aren't correct.
• Dietrich: So what you are saying is make a realistic worst -case forecast and reduce that
by 30%.
• Levine: That is what the City has committed to. I don't know how we are doing in
relation to that commitment.
• Smith: I can at least calculate it and look at it.
• Dietrich: The truth is unless you reduce emissions dramatically from 1990, we're
screwed. The real goal should not have been 30% less than worst -case, it should have
been exactly what Kyoto said.
• Smith: At least. Another way to look at it may be: to meet it as it was set up would
require a 1.1 million reduction in 2010, no matter what forecast is.
• York: You will give the report to Council anyhow. We can perhaps add something to
punch it in.
• Levine: One of the challenges for the City is a city that is growing like Fort Collins is
not necessarily population growth, but people going from somewhere else and coming
here. Where they have left, they're not using the same amounts of per capita.
• McMaster: Unfortunately with more people coming in to the city from outside, that gets
skewed unfairly.
• Levine: Everyone is disheartened when per capita is going up and you could see no
justifiable reason for that increase. A lot of it does seem to be happening.
Updates
• Levine: Ken Moore has resigned. It was because of changes to his business plans. He
was the vice -chair, so we will have to do something about that.
• McMaster: How do we go about filling his spot? Can it start immediately?
• Smith: We will have to reappoint someone to fill that position. That appointment
would be good until we do the official reappointment process in April. I will double
check the bylaws.
• Levine: That's for the vice -chair appointment. We won't be able to fill his slot on the
board until next year.
• McMaster: I'm planning on leaving for Australia on September 20`h and gone for 3
months. I will be in contact via email. I apologize, especially being a new member, but
this is not a normal thing in my life.
• Smith: Congratulations!
Meeting adjourned 8:00 PM
Submitted by Liz Skelton
Administrative Secretary I
Air Quality Advisory Board
08/23/2005
Page 18 of 18
Approved by the Board on September 27, 2005
Signed
A�'�
Liz Sk n `
Administrative Secretary I
Extension: 6600
09/30/05
Date