Greening Mass Transit & Metro Regions: The Final Report - MTA

TRANSFORMATIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS
Recommendation 1. Quantify and Track the MTA’s Materials Flow
The Commission calls on the MTA to develop a unified baseline of the materials flow across all agencies. This baseline
should facilitate the development of a system for tracking and managing systemwide materials flow information, including
procurement, waste disposal, and recycling. The system should eventually connect MTA procurements at one end with
MTA waste recycling and disposal at the other, treating procurement, waste management, and recycling as parts of an
integrated whole. The procurement goal should be to classify, green, lighten, minimize, and recapture a significant percentage
of the MTA’s annual materials procurements. On the disposal side, the goal should be to quantify and track MTA waste in
four categories: (1) customer-generated waste, (2) process-generated waste, (3) construction and demolition debris, and
(4) office waste. By developing consistent metrics and steadily merging the procurement and disposal sides, the MTA will
evolve a valuable system for reducing costs, recapturing materials, and greening its entire operation.
Recommendation 2. Green the MTA’s Procurements and Operating Budget
To begin action on Recommendation 1, the MTA should review the nearly $2 billion spent annually on material and service
procurements, identifying purchase categories that can be greened, reduced, or recaptured. To further systemize its present
green programs, the MTA should plan to unify policies and practices as recommended above. The plan should incorporate
ongoing programs, while further specifying green materials, purchasing practices, performance standards, and contracts.
The All-Agencies Procurement Council and the new
MTA Businesses Services Center are natural places
to begin this process. The plan should include:
Developing LCA for Transit Systems
• A unified electronic system for gathering data
Lifecycle Analysis (LCA) assesses products all the way from raw materials through
for convenient procurement tracking and an annual
manufacturing, transportation, and disposal to determine the total environmental
Sustainability Progress Report. Wherever possible, the
and CO2 effects. An LCA process can be found in the subsections of the ISO 14000
plan should convert projects into units of “carbon avoid- environmental management standards. ISO 14040:2006 provides the definiance,”
using the SROI model presented in this report.
tions, principles, and framework for LCA. ISO 14044:2006 specifies requirements
and guidelines. The ISO standards offer a good starting point for the MTA's LCA
• An MTA Environmental Champions Program, in which
program. Additionally, a survey of transit agencies undertaken by the Commission
each MTA facility or department designates a volunteer
identified a new transit-based LCA plan with 14 goals introduced by the Toronto
Environmental Champion responsible for sustainability
Transit Commission (TTC) in July 2008. The MTA is reviewing both the ISO 14000
education, outreach, and motivation. This program could
plans and the new TTC plan to begin developing an LCA plan that can be used by
be coupled with employee incentives, including awards
other transit agencies as well.
for green ideas and achievements.
Recommendation 3. Institute a Systemwide
Green Lifecycle Analysis (LCA) System to Manage Materials from Procurements Through Disposal
In accordance with the previous recommendation, the Commission suggests that the MTA institute a Lifecycle Analysis
(LCA) system to manage materials from procurements through disposal. This LCA system will allow the MTA Agencies
to accurately price and justify green procurement opportunities. The LCA would rationalize costs over the full lifecycle
of the materials, products, or services, taking account of designated sustainability benefits. Examples include the lower
maintenance cost associated with LED lighting or the lower CO2 output from rail shipping of excavation soil. The LCA
plan should include:
• Software models for efficient tracking and analysis, along with examples of current LCA programs. The MTA could use
an off-the-shelf quantitative lifecycle software program (such as CMLCA, BEES, and others) or environmental management
systems (such as the ISO 14044/14048 standards) to develop its own LCA system. Currently NYCT's CPM is ISO
14001 Certified.
• Develop an LCA Scoring System: Environmentally Preferable Purchasing (EPP) and Product Evaluation Model. The model
would include six procedural steps: (1) compare off-the-shelf products categorized by product end-uses on a lifecycle basis,
(2) determine product categories and subcategories, along with weighted decision criteria, (3) identify candidate products
for the EPP list evaluation, using a range of screening tools, (4) assign positive procurement scores within the EPP+ lists,
(5) gather information and score candidate products, and (6) promote the use of EPP+ lists.
• Develop a method for identifying and quantifying cost savings – both dollar savings and carbon avoidance savings –
from green initiatives.
45