Tag: climate emergency

  • Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation RFEI

    INTRODUCTION

    Based in New York’s Hudson Valley, the Center for Post Carbon Logistics (the Center) is engaged in a long-running campaign to bring the idea of coastal trade under sail and other zero emission vessels  back to the United States. The Center is currently focusing on turning the New York -New Jersey Harbor and Hudson Valley into a world-class sail freight hub for training, ship building, sailmaking, trade in small wind ships, and resilient working waterfronts. Implementation is underway; cohosting the Conference On Small Scale Inland And Coastal Sail Freight at the Hudson River Maritime Museum with Schooner Apollonia in November 2022, supporting the Northeast Grain Race of 2022, and other similar initiatives. The Center also responded to “Blue Highways RFEI: “NYC DOT, EDC Seek Creative Solutions to Move More Freight Via Waterways Instead of Roadways,” and has provided technical comments on several New York City waterfront plans, RFEIs. and RFPs.

    The Center’s publications include the Sail Freight Handbook, now in its second edition, and the Rondout Riverport 2040, a detailed imagination of a working waterfront future for Kingston. Other publications, including an Apprentice Sailor’s Handbook, are under development to support additional training efforts. The Center’s training programs are being developed for sailmaking, working sail, cargo handling, boatbuilding, traditional rigging, designing climate adapted small ports, and other specialties. These courses are planned to be offered starting in 2024, in cooperation with other organizations in the region. 

    WHY THE CENTER RESPONDED

    As shipyard and fabrication work is a good training ground for a number of skilled trades, including welders, metal fabricators, electricians, plumbers, carpenters and cabinetmakers, solar panel installers, riggers, and others, this is a prime industry to take advantage of the training programs offered at BNY. These trades can all create pipelines from the training programs currently hosted at Brooklyn Naval Yard, providing approximately 35-50 permanent jobs and contract or internship jobs for potentially dozens more technicians depending on order-book status.

    The products of this facility will not only provide the devices and vehicles necessary for Energy Transition, they will create jobs both fabricating and operations. The fabrication shop employment numbers have been enumerated above, but each vessel launched will require between 4-12 sailors, each bike and trailer set will require a rider, and maintainers for these last-mile machines will also be required. These second-order job impacts can be significant, and while not all of them will accumulate to New York City due to exports, a considerable number will remain in the Metro Area and New York State. For many of the ships, New York sailors may well be the crew, regardless of where in the world they end up sailing.

    WHAT OTHER ORGANIZATIONS, BUSINESSES, AND INDIVIDUALS CAN DO

    Forming a Coalition for a Zero Carbon Maritime Future in Brooklyn

    This future at the Brooklyn Navy Yard is currently beyond the capabilities of the Center for Post Carbon Logistics and its partner organizations, but it is not beyond the capabilities of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation. There are a wide range of shipyards in the New York Metro Area, and businesses seeking to acquire new-build vessels for Blue Highways work in the Northeast US region. Finding supporting organizations and initial customers for this endeavor should not be difficult if the BNYDC wishes to pursue this sustainable maritime future for the site. Your letters of support (sample included after our letter) will enable us to build the kind of coalition necessary to convince the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation to use the facility for what it was designed to do. The Center for Post Carbon Logistics is ready to assist in the design, construction, and operations of  a new shipyard at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Please add your comments so that the request for proposals (RFP) for the redevelopment is compatible with these near zero emission maritime uses.

    The following is a letter from the Center for Post Carbon Logistics responding to Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation Request for Expression of Interest (RFEI. Also included is a draft letter of support.

    June 17, 2024

    Andrew Tran Director of Development

    Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation

    141 Flushing Ave, Building 77, Unit 801

    Brooklyn, NY 11205

    Director Tran and All Concerned,

    The following is the Center for Post Carbon Logistics (the Center) response to the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation (BNYDC) RFEI for the unique opportunity to develop a 2.75-acre site on the Brooklyn waterfront for clean energy infrastructure or the production of climate technology.

    The intent of the BNYDC’s RFEI is to gather information about how the BNYDC can facilitate the development, production and deployment of a significant amount of [energy transition] “devices” of varying sizes and scales (i.e. heat pumps, solar panels, electric vehicle chargers, transmission stations, battery energy storage systems, to name a few).  BNYDC has a rare opportunity to redevelop the Site to provide critically needed clean energy infrastructure and/or establish industrial space that will develop products addressing climate change and create jobs in New York City’s emerging “green economy.”

    Ironically the one “device” whose manufacture is most suited to the site is not mentioned – zero emission ships. These ships, now being built in Europe and Asia include both old and new technology that directly addresses climate change.  These designs innovatively combine efficient battery storage, electric motors, solar panels, modern and traditional wind propulsion technology, materials, and ship building technology.  With a shipyard available in New York Harbor, these vessels would join the repurposed and purpose built ships in operation right now on the Hudson River and the Harbor.

    Locally built, from locally sourced and recycled materials, crewed with locally trained mariners, home ported along the Hudson, the Harbor, and the canals, carrying locally grown, locally processed, and locally manufactured goods – with liberty from fossil fuels, these future proof ships will be a positive disruption to the status quo.

    The Center is a New York based non-profit organization working to connect communities through resilient and sustainable maritime trade. By supporting the development of climate resilient small ports, sail and solar electric cargo and passenger vessels, and human-scale last-mile logistics solutions throughout the Hudson Valley and Northeast US, the Center advocates for a post-carbon freight network in our own region and across the nation. We work with a coalition of operators of zero/low carbon emission vessels,

    Page 2, The Center for Post Carbon Logistics response to Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation RFEI

    cargo owners, naval architects, mariners, boat builders, advocates, and researchers all focused on re-building the long-neglected regional “Blue Highways.“

    In light of New York City’s array of initiatives to increase maritime freight transport, including DockNYC, Blue Highways, NYC Working Waterfront Plan, Freight NYC, and others, it makes sense that New York would want to see the vessels and infrastructure needed to implement these plans manufactured in New York as an example for the entire nation. The Brooklyn Navy Yard is one of the few places this could be done in the Northeast, let alone New York City, and ships for other regions and international trade could also be built for export in this facility.

    The Brooklyn Navy Yard produced US military ships from 1801 to 1966, and through 1975 constructed multiple 220,000-ton Very Large Crude Carriers, tug and barge units, and barges under a commercial shipyard. In 2011 the site was a finalist for constructing a new class of chemical carriers for US Domestic and international buyers. Clearly this facility is still an important American maritime asset, and the offered facility was built as the main fabrication shop for commercial ship construction. The fully enclosed building is empty, with reinforced floors, oversize doors, overhead cranes, and industrial utilities, and there are various public and private incentives available for modernization and upgrades.

    The US currently lags in design and construction of low-carbon ships to re-develop a sustainable marine highway system. This does not need to be the case, and a coalition of shipbuilders, naval architects, ship operators, and others can easily be built to make New York and the Brooklyn Navy Yard a central part of the shipbuilding industry once again. The site is ideal for bringing existing successful green vessel designs to the US for domestic trade, and selected export markets. In so doing, scores of permanent maritime and ship yard  jobs will be created at BNY, with dozens more seasonal trade jobs, and hundreds of jobs aboard the vessels launched from this facility, which can be incorporated with existing training programs.

    The RFEI is open only to “Clean Energy Infrastructure” and “Climate Solutions Urban Manufacturing” proposals.  Shipbuilding falls under the latter category and is a strategically important nationally. There are few locations available for and have the capacity for shipbuilding activities, whereas hundreds of locations could be used to build the devices mentioned in the RFEI. Assigning this essential maritime resource to a use which does not require its unique set of circumstances will be a significant blow to future domestic shipbuilding capabilities. This is a matter of National importance considering Jones Act restrictions for domestic trade which require vessels carrying passengers or cargo between two US ports be US built, flagged, and owned, as well as crewed by US citizens or nationals. The US shipbuilding industry is already close to capacity just maintaining and building Navy contracts, leaving little capacity for civilian construction. Diverting possible resources for other uses is a blow not only to the national and global maritime energy transition, but to the possibility of taking the quickest and longest-proven method of reducing roadway traffic congestion, fossil fuel dependence, and transportation-based greenhouse gas emissions by mode-shifting freight to marine highways.

    This is a chance to continue a centuries-long tradition at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, while achieving all of the BNYDC’s goals, and supporting additional City, State, and Federal initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, create jobs, and foster innovation in industry.  The current opportunity at the Brooklyn Navy Yard is an unprecedented opportunity to kickstart the construction and employment of short sea, canal, coastal, and cross-harbor near-zero emissions vessels, that will be employed in New York Harbor, the

    Page 3, The Center for Post Carbon Logistics response to Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation RFEI

    Hudson River, New York State Canal System, and beyond. The site’s history and current situation both lend themselves to this use, and a coalition of the necessary organizations to make this work is already forming around New York Harbor.  We look forward to working alongside you in making this sustainable maritime future a reality.

    Sincerely,

    Andrew Willner

    Executive Director

    [DRAFT LETTER OF SUPPORT]

    Andrew Tran

    Director of Development

    The Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation

    141 Flushing Ave, Building 77, Unit 801

    Brooklyn, NY 11205

    Director Tran and All Concerned,

    We write today in support of the proposed plan by the Center for Post Carbon Logistics to revive domestic shipbuilding at Brooklyn Navy Yard’s Building 293. The National, State, Regional, and Local importance of this proposal cannot be understated. Modal shift of freight to maritime highways is the best and most immediate means of reducing air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, traffic congestion and casualties, and fossil fuel dependence in the Northeast US and beyond.

    Due to the Jones Act of 1920, vessels carrying cargo between two US Ports must be US built, owned, flagged, and crewed, and there are few facilities remaining which can build advanced, 21st century cargo vessels for cross-harbor, short sea, and long distance coastal trade. The number of well paid permanent green jobs generated directly and indirectly by returning this portion of the Brooklyn Navy Yard to shipbuilding will likely number in the hundreds, while creating the hardware needed to realize the vision of New York City as a world hub of green maritime transportation and an example for the world’s energy transition.

    [Paragraph describing organization and further reasons for support]

    Sincerely

                    [SIGNATURE BLOCK]



  • Rondout Riverport 2040

    A publication of:

    The Center for Post Carbon Logistics

    Rondout Riverport 2040
    © Andrew Willner 2022

    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons. Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

    Rondout past and future

    This work does not constitute an exhaustive or direct set of procedures, but points the way to developing your own plans for resilient small ports. No part of this publication can be used directly without adaptation to local circumstances, and does not constitute legal, business, investment, or financial advice.

    Rondout Riverport 2040 proposes a pragmatic and prosperous vision for the near future with a transformed port, boasting a shore lined with leading-edge and heritage maritime commerce that profit and engage while allowing for an equitable transition beyond fossil fuels.

    Rondout Riverport will offer more capacity, be significantly more compact, and more resilient than the current patchwork of land uses found on today’s waterfront. The mission of tomorrow’s port is the post carbon maritime transport of goods and people up and down the Hudson River and beyond. Riverport is designed to attract shipping, distribution, commerce, food processing, and craft businesses. The result: a regenerative working waterfront — a gateway to the Hudson Valley and world.

    The port’s versatility will depend on the linking of its economic opportunities with environmental restoration, sustainable commerce, and training centers. This multi-generational project will also be a source of inspiration for broader long-term action on climate change.

  • Comments on the Transportation Sector of the New York State Climate Action Council Draft Scoping Plan

    July 1, 2022

    Draft Scoping Plan Comments
    NYSERDA
    17 Columbia Circle
    Albany, NY 12203-6399

    scopingplan@nyserda.ny.gov

    Although these comments refer primarily to the Transportation Sector, we reserve the right to comment, in writing or in person, on the final version of the Scope of Work and any draft and final versions of the New York State Climate Action Plan and other documents, legislation, and regulations pertaining to the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act of 2019 (CLCPA).

    The Center for Post Carbon Logistics (C4PCL) is a New York State non-profit organization that envisions a world of resilient, re-localized communities connected to one another through post carbon transport and logistics systems.[i] The Mission of The Center for Post Carbon Logistics is to research and assist in the implementation of appropriate post carbon maritime technology needed to keep commerce and transportation viable by responding to the interrelated connectivity, communication, equity, economic, ecological, and energy crises of the   21st Century. 

    Overview of the Scoping Plan and the Transportation Sector:

    The C4PCL agrees with and applauds the Council’s Benefits of Adaptation and Resilience and expects that the comments provided by the informed and engaged public will bolster the Council’s resolve to implement policies, programs, and projects to reach and exceed these aspirational goals in the short, mid, and long term.

    Adaptation and resilience planning is about protecting people and ecosystems from the changes caused by a changing climate. Individuals, communities, and regions have come to recognize the need to prepare for the risks posed to their quality of life, infrastructure, and physical safety by climate change. These risks are disproportionately high for Disadvantaged Communities. Investment in adaptation and resilience can improve quality of life, stimulate local economies, and protect the environment.

    Chapter 2. of the Scoping Plan lays out the impacts of climate change in New York.  The C4PCL agrees with the analysis of the impacts of the climate crisis and is willing and able to assist the Council in informing the broadest possible population with the immediacy of the threat and the need to act quickly with the necessary information to effect real change.

    New York’s geographic and socioeconomic diversity will lead to a wide range of experienced climate driven impacts. Warming trends and incidences of intense heat waves will contribute to greater localized heat stresses; heavy rainfall events that exacerbate localized flooding will continue to impact food production, natural ecosystems, and water resources; and sea-level rise threatens sensitive coastal communities and ecosystems. Climate-driven impacts are magnified when accounting for New York’s most vulnerable populations, who are often disproportionately affected and on the front lines of climate change.

    The Council has a responsibility to empower individuals and communities in the far-reaching actions required to mitigate and adapt to the negative socio-economic-environmental impacts of climate change. A key component must be a move away from a large-scale, global production/distribution model and toward re-localization – achieving fulfilling and equitable local livelihoods, lived in harmony with home bioregions.

    Underpinning this transition is an understanding that the climate crisis requires urgent national, state, regional, and local action now. Without immediate action in New York’s transportation sector, an era of far-more-costly, and less available, fossil fuels – marked by disastrous global supply chain interruptions and shortages – looms and is inevitable. We have lost the resilience needed to cope with such system shocks. So immediate adaptation is essential.

    Because words have power, The Council, must pay close attention to the thousands of commentors and be prepared to craft a compelling collective story – a promising vision of what New York in a carbon constrained future might be – not so much in policy and technological terms, but by providing community leaders the information and tools they need to engage their communities, family, friends, neighbors, and colleagues about what a positive path through the climate crisis will entail – to explore an array of innovative heritage and leading-edge technologies by which New Yorkers can thrive in decades ahead – designing and realizing pragmatic, environmentally and economically sound tools for peacefully, equitably, and intelligently transitioning away from fossil fuels. We must act together, using all our skill, ingenuity and intelligence, our home-grown creativity and cooperation, to unleash the collective genius of local communities, individuals, organizations, supported by the climate action plan, to achieve an abundant, connected, and healthier future for all.

    As a species, we are storytellers. And the stories we tell collectively, whether they be found in Gilgamesh, the Bible, folklore, tradition, or government policy all serve as action plans for the time. They tell us what worked well in the past so we might move into a productive future. But sometimes those tales become outdated and the signposts pointing to safety in the past instead lead us down paths into danger.

    The tale we’ve told ourselves over the last 300 years, since the “Age of Reason” and on into the modern Age of Expansion, is that we live in a time of limitless progress, of ever-expanding opportunity and possibility, in which there is a high technological fix for every problem.

    In this story, we tell ourselves that unlimited growth and soaring GDP is a real measure of economic health and community wellbeing; that a rising stock market protects us, no matter how rundown our neighborhoods; that deregulation stimulates investment, even as climate destabilizing emissions rise; and that national security need only focus on existential threats beyond our borders, and not on quality of life and preservation of civil liberties.

    Today, climate change — along with the socio-environmental and economic upheaval it brings — is turning the idea of endless progress on its head.  That’s why it is long past time for us to tell a new story: one that recognizes the turbulent sea of change we sail in; a story that recognizes the dangers around us but doesn’t demand a fear or grief response. This new story inspires us to prepare together as communities with open eyes, minds, and hearts — ready to face the risks of impending calamity while embracing the promise of resilience and hope of regeneration.

    We need to change the narrative now, embrace a new story truer to circumstance — a storyline in which we heroically face adversity together, creating abundance out of crisis together, moving with agility through chaos toward new community values that will sustain us in the unsettled years ahead. The roots of that story are certain: we will thrive only by being earth and community stewards, rather than exploiters; only by demanding that our leaders address not only the economic balance sheet, but also our ecological and equity balance sheets. Only then will we be able to go ahead with hope and find a safe harbor in the climate crisis. Only then can we leave a better world for our children.

    For the Council to tell this story we must first Assess and Evaluate:  Start by objectively assessing threats, then unflinchingly evaluate the greatest points of weakness — whether these take the form of infrastructure; social, public health, economic, environmental, or political structures. We need to fortify those weaknesses against the storms to come — work that will enrich our State, cities, towns, and neighborhoods in the present, while reducing risk and enhancing resilience for the future.  Unfortunately, the Transportation Sector is tepid in its goals and strategy for finding solutions in a timely way to the unfolding climate crisis in New York.  It is time for bold action not “hedging.,” because there is generally resistance to change, and The Council and its recommendations have powerful adversaries. 

    An astroturf[1] organization, New Yorkers for Affordable Energy, a fossil fuel industry front group,  retained SKDKnickerbocker, a public relations and lobbying firm with a history of operating similar front groups working to undermine workers’ and tenants’ rights.

    The corporate interests behind New Yorkers for Affordable Energy have already succeeded in eliminating a proposal from the state budget to ban fossil gas hookups in newly constructed buildings – which was recommended by the Climate Action Council in its draft scoping plan –  and are now promoting misinformation to further weaken New York’s agenda as the Climate Action Council reviews comments on its proposed plan.

    New Yorkers for Affordable Energy launched a television ad that seeks to drum up opposition to the proposal through misinformation. The ad claims that the bill would “ban gas stoves and furnaces… sticking you with a $30,000 price tag to replace them.” Energy Citizens an arm of the American Petroleum Industry is telling an untruthful but compelling story…….. Want Albany to choose your appliances?  And Don’t let the government tell you what kind of appliance you can buy.“

    The first thing that the Council must do to counter this negative propaganda is clarify the crisis and provide the informed and engaged public with attainable goals for a “softer landing” for our children and grandchildren in what is likely to be a chaotic midcentury future.  And hire an equally talented public information/crisis management consultant to counter the incessant and misleading negativity of the New Yorkers for Affordable Energy.

    The Council must re-evaluate the use of terms like growth and competitiveness in addressing the Climate Crisis:

    The faster we produce and consume goods, the more we damage the environment,” Giorgos Kallis, an ecological economist at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, writes in his manifesto, “Degrowth.” “There is no way to both have your cake and eat it, here. If humanity is not to destroy the planet’s life support systems, the global economy should slow down.”

    In “Growth: From Microorganisms to Megacities,” Vaclav Smil, a Czech-Canadian environmental scientist, complains that economists haven’t grasped “the synergistic functioning of civilization and the biosphere,” yet they “maintain a monopoly on supplying their physically impossible narratives of continuing growth that guide decisions made by national governments and companies.

    In the mid-1970s, the phrase “small is beautiful” became a counterculture slogan against the industrial threat to the environment and the scarcity of resources. Arguing against excessive materialism and meaningless growth, the late Dr. Ernest Friedrich Schumacher—the author of Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered,

    … promoted the use of small-scale technology to benefit both humankind and the environment. As an economist trained in a market-oriented discipline, his thinking evolved from believing that large-scale technology could be salvation for industrial civilization to believing that large-scale technology is the root of degrading human beings and the environment.

    In the Transportation Sector, as well as the entirety of the Scope of work for the Climate Plan, a new way of looking at the economy, culture and environment of New York must be adopted.  The idea that growth is necessary skews the plan away from true mitigation and adaptation to the Climate Crisis.  The document also does little to explain the role of public and private transportation policy and implementation decisions made in New York, in conjunction with the federal government, in creating and exacerbating the climate crisis.[2]

    The transportation challenge: We in New York need to think differently about how to move goods and people from place to place in a carbon constrained future because we are living in an age of unprecedented change, with several crises converging. These calamities have been exacerbated by the profligate use of   cheap, non-renewable fossil fuels. This “quadruple crunch” of overlapping events, a global financial crisis, pandemics, accelerating climate change, and aberrant fluctuations in energy prices exacerbated by imminent peak oil makes it increasingly clear that this combination of events threaten to develop into a “perfect storm” with devastating economic and environmental consequences for not just the New York but for the country and the world.

    New York’s transportation sector contributes almost 30% of carbon emissions. And the seminal questions that should be asked by the Council in this sector is:

    • In a carbon constrained future, how will goods and people be moved from place to place, and what role will The Climate Action Plan provide in resources and leadership? 
    • How should we meet the looming challenges of climate change, rising sea level, aging infrastructure, changes to global shipping and supply chains, threats to food security, and the risks these changes bring to New York’s environmental, cultural, and financial wellbeing?
    • How do we address this daunting multitude of challenges and turn them into opportunities for transforming transportation to serve our State far effectively and efficiently into the future?

    Summary of Recommendations: C4PCL’s comments focus on opportunities, adaptation, and mitigation in the Transportation Sector and on solutions that use and enhance New York’s entrepreneurial, commercial, and industrial enterprises, makers, processors, local resources, and by training and employing New Yorkers in a carbon constrained future.

    Recommendation 1. Decarbonize Maritime Transportation: Moving goods and people from place to place in a carbon constrained future will be dependent on sailing vessels, hybrid/fossil free electric ships, and people/electric, powered transport for first and last mile logistics.

    Recommendation 2. Converting ICE vehicles to EVs/ZEVs/alternative fuels: There is very little disagreement that EVs/ZEVs are the future of the automobile and light truck industry.  Over the lifetime of a ZEV the carbon footprint is significantly less than an internal combustion vehicle.  One huge problem given short shrift in the Scope is what happens to all those ICE vehicles that get traded in?

    Recommendation 3. Improved and Free Transit: Tallinn, Estonia made international headlines when it became the first capital city in the world to introduce free public transport for its residents in 2013.

    Recommendation 4. Demand Responsive Transportation (DRT): When it comes to improving public transportation in rural areas—flexibility is key. The first step is to provide an easy and efficient way for more people to access public transportation. On-Demand Public transportation, also known as Demand-Responsive Transportation (DRT) provides a way to increase the geographical coverage of a traditional public transit service.

    Recommendation 5.  Electrification of commuter, interstate, and municipal buses: Close to 90% of commuter intra and interstate buses are diesel powered.  Some municipalities are transitioning to hybrid and electric buses, but the Plan should include regulation, incentives, and subsidies for the conversion of all diesel-powered buses. 

    Recommendation 6. Electrification and Solarization of freight and passenger trains: Trains are one of the most efficient and sustainable form of transport.  Worldwide around 75% of trains have been electrified, while 25% still use fossil fuels. The bad news is that even electric locomotives use a partially polluting mix

    Recommendation 7. Improved bicycle and E-bike transportation opportunities: Although electric bicycles didn’t receive much attention during the COP26— to the chagrin of some sustainability mobility advocates — 2021 was the year they found a more welcoming home around the world. An analysis by Business Research published in mid-November estimated global e-bike sales at $36.5 billion for the year, a compound annual growth rate of more than 12 percent over 2020. Within three years, revenue could reach $53.3 billion, the market research firm predicts.

    Recommendation 8. Airships and electric aircraft: Airships are relatively inexpensive, they can carry a substantial amount of cargo, and they are significantly more environmentally friendly than their heavier-than-air relatives. Once thought to have passed into memory, airships are having something of a renaissance.

    ——————————————————————————————————————————–

    Recommendation 1: Decarbonize Maritime Transportation

    Moving goods and people from place to place in a carbon constrained future will be dependent on sailing vessels, hybrid/fossil free electric ships, and people/electric, powered transport for first and last mile logistics.

    Despite its present dominance, our current maritime logistics system is fragile. It is reliant upon carbon-based fuels driving internal combustion engines. It is interwoven into long-distance, globalized world trade. It is designed for Just-In-Time delivery. And it depends upon its present ability to avoid paying for negative externalities such as carbon emissions and environmental pollution, and to avoid being governed by meaningful labor, environmental, health, and other laws.

    polluting vessel

    The international shipping industry is one of the largest greenhouse gas emitters. If the maritime sector were a country, it would be one of the top six carbon polluters.  The shipping industry has been reluctant to take unilateral leadership on emissions.  The International Maritime Organization (IMO) is puttering around the edges. It recently declined to make a greenhouse gas reduction plan or commitment. The United States for a variety of reasons, chief among them that there is a tiny US flag fleet, has remained almost silent on this issue.

    The Center for Post Carbon Logistics (C4PCL), along with a local, regional, and international coalition posit an alternative.  That alternative is disruptive competition from an emerging suite of technologies –solar, wind/sail, and green hydrogen  powered shipping on New York waterways.  Water-borne shipping, even now, is dramatically more energy-efficient than its land-based counterpart.  New York, with its network of waterways connecting the Great Lakes to the Hudson, to New York Harbor, and the ocean, has a leadership opportunity in growing this industry.

    Achieving New York State’s Climate Act’s goals will require addressing the enormous footprint of transporting goods and people using fossil fuels.  Building Future Proof ships in New York’s Hudson River shipyards is the first step toward a regenerative shipping industry on New York’s canals, the Hudson River, The Harbor, the East Coast, Caribbean, and transatlantic routes.

    New York’s Waterways:

    What role will New York’s waterways play a carbon constrained future? How should we meet the looming challenges of climate change, rising sea level, aging infrastructure, changes to global shipping patterns, threats to food security, and the risks these changes bring to New York?

    The USDOT Maritime Administration (MARAD) America’s Marine Highway Program was created by Congress in 2007 and expanded in 2012 and 2016. Marine Highways are water-based freight corridors. For example, M-87 includes the Hudson River and connects ports and harbors from New York City to Albany and navigation channels such as the Erie Canal. The MARAD program was created to expand the use of the country’s navigable waterways to relieve landside congestion, reduce air emissions, and provide new transportation options to increase the efficiency of the surface transportation system. MARAD administers a grant program to fund system improvements. New York is served by Marine Highways M-87, M-90, M-95, and M-295.

    The Hudson River, a Water Highway

    Not so long ago the Hudson River was a bustling highway linking even the smallest communities to a web of regularly scheduled commercial routes. Schooners, sloops, barges, and (much later) steamboats provided a unique way of life for early river town inhabitants. Farmers, merchants, quarrymen, brick factories, and oystermen relied on this vibrant and diverse fleet of vessels to bring in supplies and deliver their goods to market. This arm-of-the-sea was an integral part of the lives of those who worked New York’s waterways.

    However, life at the water’s edge is rapidly changing. The impacts of new technology, patterns of urban development, and globalization are redefining global logistics, and while some waterfront cities will thrive as ports and grow under these new conditions, others will need to evolve to survive and succeed…. How will New York re-invent its maritime transportation sector?

    How do we address this daunting multitude of challenges and turn them into opportunities for transforming our waterways and ports to serve our regional and national economy effectively and efficiently into the future?

    • If present trends continue, New York and its largest and smallest ports will need to be transformed into the spokes of a hub for “short sea shipping”  rather than serving as terminus for unsustainable container cargo. The good news: the New York has an extensive network of waterways, and so is very well suited for the short sea shipping mode of freight transport. Moreover, public agencies and private companies are investigating the potential economic and environmental benefits of transferring more cargo from road to sea.
    • As New York moves forward to low/no carbon shipping and the working waterfronts of tomorrow, the constraints, and in some cases the advantages, of smaller and (s)lower tech modes of transport must be considered to support these imminent changes.
    • If the New York’s maritime transport and working waterfronts are to thrive, 19th, 20th, and 21st Century technology must meld seamlessly into new, mid-century methods of transport with an emphasis on what might seem like bygone, but productive, methodologies to become more self-sufficient and sustainable.

    Priorities, amendments/additions to Transportation Sector:

    Green Shipping Corridor
    1. The Council Adopts a Hudson River Green Shipping Corridor:[ii]

    Achieving zero emissions from maritime transportation over the coming years and decades will require research, development, demonstration, and deployment at a massive scale, as well as enabling policies that incentivize the shift to low- and zero-emission fuels and technologies as soon as possible.  Adoption of these fuels and technologies, while limited in the short term, will rapidly accelerate once the supply chain is established and governments and the shipping sector signal their intent for energy transition.Green shipping corridors are meant to accelerate this early adoption phase. They therefore should strive for emissions reductions that push the envelope beyond business-as-usual, demonstrating a commitment to achieve full decarbonization through sustained efforts.  Green shipping corridors will not achieve zero emissions across all aspects of the corridor overnight.  Instead, the journey to establish a fully decarbonized corridor is a series of steps and actions taken over time to cover all aspects of the route.

    One of the first steps in creating a green shipping corridor is to convene relevant stakeholders across the value chain and to outline anticipated timelines, targets, and achievements.  Creating a fully decarbonized green shipping corridor is a process, which will require long-term plans to help participants achieve their emissions reduction goals.  Stakeholder engagement will be critical, especially with residents in communities with environmental justice concerns, to ensure strategies are tailored to address the priorities and goals of near-port communities. New York State through its Climate Plan establishes the Hudson River, and the New York State Canal System as the nation’s first Green Shipping Corridor.

    2. The Council/New York DOT Support a MARAD Marine Highway Project Designation for M-87 Hudson River:

    In April 2022 the C4PCL and colleagues[3] provided the NYSDOT, with materials for consideration to become the applicant for the Maritime Administration, Marine Highway project designation for Hudson River based maritime commerce projects.  The Department responded after several weeks of deliberations, without explanation, that the project did not qualify.  We, adamantly disagree and although the deadline for applications for project designations has passed for this year, we believe that these projects have merit and will continue to pursue them, and specifically ask that this project designation is included in the Climate Plan’s Transportation Sector. 

    New York Marine Highways

    Why this designation?

    The Hudson River properly prides itself in being the cradle of pioneering maritime technology and the birthplace of the environmental movement.  It has always been a magnet for innovative thinkers and doers in transportation technology, maritime commerce, engineering, agriculture, business, and artisanship who are inventing new ways of doing business and employing people with a smaller environmental footprint and a passion for equity and inclusion.  Our regional post carbon maritime strategy is designed to engage and support the creative economy, broadly defined, and to be disruptive in a positive way. 

    This collaborative effort extends the entire length of the M-87 Marine Highway[4] corridor and revolves around, but is not limited to the New York State Canal System, Hudson River, New York Harbor, the US East Coast, and Caribbean. 

    To highlight the benefits, increase public awareness and promote The Hudson River as a necessary alternative to “landside” shipping and transportation options, a group of maritime professionals and advocates from all around the region propose a series of Marine Highway project designations to:

    • Adopt a Hudson River Green Shipping Corridor
    • support existing and proposed low/no carbon commercial maritime ventures and post carbon logistics,
    • enhance ship building and repair industries,
    • the revitalization and resilience of small Hudson River ports,[5] 
    • and the re/training of shipwrights, longshore and logistics professionals, and mariners.  (see 6.The Hudson River Maritime Innovation Center)

    In the 19th until the mid-20th centuries, the Hudson River bustled with commerce and lay at the heart of a thriving network of “Marine Byways” — waterways stretching from the Atlantic west to the Great Lakes linking cities and the smallest communities to a web of regularly scheduled transportation routes.  For hundreds of years, thousands of ships and boats of all sizes served local cargo and passenger needs. The Hudson River — and the ships and boats sailing her — were vital to those who lived and worked along these inland waters, putting those communities on the map.

    Today, however, waterways like the Hudson River, and its small ports are underutilized. Incentivizing shippers to use this critical transportation corridor more consistently would create significant public benefits and opportunities, including but not limited to a lower carbon footprint for the movement of freight and passengers.

    Solaris

    This initiative is well along in the process with initial vessels such as the sail cargo Schooner Apollonia, and the Solar Electric CG inspected passenger vessel Solaris already in service, the Hudson River Maritime Museum’s  Boat School and maritime history exhibits, sail freight exhibit, sail freight conference, and education projects, and major sailing vessel restoration projects,  as well as active commercial, shipwrights,  shipyards and boat builders throughout the corridor.  Within the next 1 – 5 years, it will create and enhance a wide array of public benefits for the people in this strategic corridor.  It will:

    • create and sustain jobs on New York built vessels, and at ports, and shipyards
    • relieve landside congestion in transportation and shipping
    • show by practical example, the use of emerging resilient and renewable propulsion technologies
    • improve New York’s and the US economic competitiveness by adding new cost-effective freight and passenger transportation capacities
    • improve environmental sustainability of New York’s and the US transportation system by using less energy and reducing greenhouse gases per passenger or ton-mile of freight moved

    Marine Highway Proposal for Project Designation:

    Although the M-87, the Hudson River from NY Harbor to the Erie Canal is designated a Marine Highway, until recently with the reinvigoration of sail cargo and solar powered passenger service, there has been underutilization of the river’s small ports.  The primary commercial vessels currently transiting the Hudson are petroleum and chemical barges, some ocean-going ships, and tug and barge project cargo going directly from New York Harbor to Albany/Troy, and some seasonal tour and cruise ships.

    The proposed Marine Highway project designations will address this limitation as it activates a network of maritime transportation advocates, shipping and agricultural products processing enterprises, “makers” and small manufacturers, first and last mile logistics businesses, ship yards and boat builders, community organizations, municipalities, counties, and The State of New York to revitalize the Hudson’s maritime economy anticipating the challenges and advantages of moving goods and people by water in a carbon-constrained future, and to ensure that this vision is aligned with community, ecological, and equity values and sensibilities; to achieve this goal.  The following are the projects that are proposed for designation to make them eligible for funding under the Maritime Administration, Marine Highway grants program.

    Proof of Concept:

    Schooner Apollonia

    The Schooner Apollonia is engaged in commerce under sail on the Hudson River and New York Harbor. Apollonia is a 64-foot steel-hulled schooner built in Baltimore, MD in 1946. She is designed to move efficiently through the water, powered by a traditional gaff-rig sail plan designed by naval architect J Murray Watts.  With a 15’ beam and rugged steel construction, she’s a stout work boat capable of carrying 20,000 lbs. of cargo. Being a schooner, the crew requirements are smaller, and the variety of sails gives flexibility for different conditions that we will encounter on the river.  Apollonia is the descendant of the Hudson River Sloop and the proof of concept for Jones Act compliant, purpose-built sail cargo vessels designed for River, Harbor, and short sea coastal trade.

    • Hudson River/New York Harbor Sail Cargo Service
      • When designated, the project funding will be used to expand the operations of the Schooner Apollonia and the ports and customer she services.  Apollonia is an existing sail cargo business transporting primarily malt, flour, and grain to distilleries and breweries, other agricultural products to processors, and shelf stable local food and beverage products to customers.  To continue to develop the route, secure docking, loading, and unloading facilities, warehousing, first and last mile low carbon logistics, secure haul back cargoes, upgrades to existing vessel, and R&D and design a purpose-built ship(s) for this route will require significant public and private investment. 
      • Develop a low carbon logistics system, more of a “warehouse in transit,” than “just in time” model.  To implement the “parallel” low/no carbon logistics system, a “post carbon” third party logistics company (PC3PL) will be established. This PC3PL provider is a specialist company that will provide a range of distribution, storage, transport, and fulfillment services to Apollonia, (and to other vessels as the fleet expands) as well as low/no carbon first and last mile logistics companies, producers, purveyors, wholesalers, retailers, and end users. These companies would outsource these types of operations to the PC3PL business and rely on the PC3PL to offer end-to-end management of specific services.[iii]
    • The expansion of an existing maritime cargo service:

    To meet the emergent climate crisis, and to confront the immense carbon pollution of the existing fossil fueled transport of goods and people throughout New York and the Hudson Valley, a new generation of  “future proof” Liberty from Fossil Fuel Ships will be upgraded, repurposed, and locally built to enable the continued movement of goods and people from place to place by water in a carbon constrained future, and  to highlight the benefits, increase public awareness, and promote The Hudson River as a necessary alternative to “landside” shipping and transportation options.

    These ships will be brutally simple, but elegant, re-used, re-purposed, and purpose built by local shipwrights to kick start the revival of US flagged ships in domestic, short sea, and international trade. Using proven construction techniques and tried and true (as well as innovative) sail propulsion/electric propulsion technology these “flagships of the future” will be the first steps in adapting to and mitigating the climate crisis, that in significant part is caused by fossil fueled transport.

    Locally built, from locally sourced and recycled materials, crewed with locally trained mariners, home ported along the Hudson, the Harbor, and the canals, carrying locally grown, locally processed, and locally manufactured goods – with liberty from fossil fuels, these future proof ships will be a positive disruption to the status quo.

    Eriemax RSS 80 Geoff Uttmark
    1. Purpose built vessels for M-87, M-95, and M-90 Marine Highway Service:
      • Eriemax Sail/Electric Canal, River, and Coastal Cargo and Sail Training Vessel:
    2. develop final design, building plans, and price of construction at a Hudson Valley Shipyard, for a purpose-built prototype 80’ canal, river, and coastal, sail cargo vessel for a new generation of climate adaptive modular design freighters using the best combination of traditional and new technology.  The $800K to 1.5 million (estimated) price for construction could come, in part from the Federal Ship Financing Program (Title XI) and significant public, private, and crowdfunded investment.  Concept in Appendix 2.
    Electric Clipper Derek Ellard Design
    1. R&D, design, and develop shipyard drawings for a purpose built 180-200’ “short sea” and transoceanic “Electric Clipper” sail freight and training vessel with a cargo capacity of up to 900 tons or 36 TEUs. A concept drawing of this vessel is included in appendix 2. The estimated $2.5 to 3.5 million construction cost could come from the  Federal Ship Financing Program (Title XI) and significant public, private investment and crowdfunded investment. 
    2. Hudson River Solar Ferries. This grant, when designated, will support a comprehensive ferry master plan to develop a new, modern, efficient, solar electric passenger and cargo ferry design for Hudson River transits. The plan will serve as a comprehensive analysis of operations and service needs, and help determine the types, sizes, and number of ferries that are needed in the future. With a regional and national push towards a low carbon economy transition, the Hudson River passenger ferry system can incorporate technologies within the vessels that can benefit the environment, passengers, and the communities the ferries serve.  These funds will also be used to develop preliminary designs for these vessels and will make use of the three years of performance data from the operation of the solar electric Coast Guard inspected passenger vessel Solaris.  An additional option would be to convert the existing Beacon/Newburg Ferry to battery electric. This project then could be considered an expansion of existing service.  
    3. The Marine Byways and Resilient Small Port Toolkit,[iv] when designated, will collect, and disseminate (in reports, apps, and interactive websites) new and existing information to enable the revival of small port working waterfronts, and small to medium sized maritime and logistics businesses. This data collection will include but not be limited to review, analysis, and reporting of the findings of government and non-governmental reports and publications, as well as field checking and developing new sources of information.[v] Examples already underway, or completed are  GIS port mapping work being done by the Schooner Apollonia and the Center for Post Carbon Logistics with assistance from Vassar College interns,[6] and GIS flood mapping work done by Kytt McManus at Columbia, and by Scenic Hudson’s Sea Level Rise Mapper.
      1. Rondout Riverport 2040/A resilient small port blueprint 
        1. A paper prepared for a conference in September 2021 for the Wind Propulsion Conference held by the Royal Institute of Naval Architects.  The paper was republished in two parts at Resilience.org. Rondout Riverport 2040 Part 1, and Part 2.  This report and publication along with other materials can be the basis of planning for resilient small ports throughout New York.

    5. Decarbonizing Recreational Boating

    In 2018, 2019 there was total of 440,381 boat registrations, of which, 435,213 were registered for recreational purposes in New York. Those, primarily powerboats consist of fossil fueled 2 and 4 stroke outboards and inboard gasoline or diesel engines, many large and small sailboats have auxiliary outboard or inboard gasoline and diesel engines.   

    • Jet skis and pleasure boats combined accounting for 1.4 billion gallons of gasoline in the US.
    • Resins in fiberglass boats, “Dacron” in sails and lines are derived from fossil fuels
    • Boats release numerous harmful substances into aquatic and marine environments, including nitrogen oxide, particulate matter, carbon monoxide, and non-methane volatile organic compounds (NMVOCs).
    • ships and boats in the US produced about 44.5 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2019

    E-boat and electric motor manufacturing opportunities

    Electric powered boats, like electric automobiles were ubiquitous in the early to mid-twentieth century and are seeing a resurgence as motors, batteries, and solar panels become lighter and more available.  There are New York based electric boat and motor manufacturers and with the appropriate incentives, such as expanding the Green Boat program statewide will provide more employment opportunities and economic development while reducing the carbon footprint of recreational and tourism boating.

    • Solar Sal Boats is a solar electric boatbuilding manufacturer founded by David Borton a New York based solar boat pioneer.  Solar Sal boats was the client for the construction of Solaris, the Hudson River Maritime Museum’s solar electric Coast Guard inspected solar electric passenger vessel.
    • Elco is a electric yacht and motor manufacturer located in New York.  “Combining traditional and proven designs with trailblazing motor and control technology, Elco leads the industry in electric propulsion. Elco outboard and inboard electric and hybrid propulsion systems provide quiet and clean power for those water-based activities.”
    • Finger Lake Electric Boat  is an electric boat company located in the heart of the Finger lakes of New York. Taking over the production of Adirondack Electric Boat that started in the year 2001 they are continuing the production of Adirondack style electric boats.  In addition to building the Adirondack style electric boats we are in the process of adding new electric boat models to the Finger Lakes Electric Boat fleet.
    • Halevai Boats will build renewable energy solutions for the marine industry. We are developing better building materials and methods to build boats. Founded in 2020, Halevai is a new concept boat manufacturer focused on design, reliability and conservation.  Our debut craft, the model 2050, was inspired by the goals of the historic COP21 UN climate conference and is the first high performance boat in its category to be fully electric powered.  
    • Scarano Boat Company electric powered canal boat replica.  Scarano Boat designs and builds period wood, aluminum, composite, and steel boats, Coast Guard–certified for public transportation and excursions. Scarano Boat has developed a national reputation for modern wood construction. Scarano Boat has found a niche in the production of replica sailing vessels, and certified passenger vessels with classic styling and appointments. 
    electic catamaran conversion (Rik van Hemmen)

    Converting Fossil Fueled recreational boats to hybrid/electric

    Instead of developing technologies to replace current recreational boating equipment, some vessels can be “retrofitted,” for a more efficient performance.

    • For example, in 2015, a small team of researchers successfully converted an 18’ Pursuit 2000 S2 gasoline-powered boat into a hybrid electric boat, or HEB. Specifically, they replaced a nonfunctional Evinrude 225 V6 engine with a battery-powered electric motor.[7] The new eco-friendly design is intended for use in rivers and lakes, primarily. The deep-cycle batteries can be solar charged and powered by a hydrogen fuel cell unit as a bonus.  
    • In 2020, another team followed suit, aiming to “[convert] a traditional internal combustion engine-powered leisure boat into an electric propelled type.” This project also focused on battery power, particularly a Battery Energy Storage System (BESS). This reduces fuel consumption and could potentially save boaters money on refueling.[8]

    According to the American Boating Association, “Clean boating and other forms of environmental stewardship (or the lack thereof) has the potential to affect a significant portion of the Nation’s economy.”. Electric propulsion can start to put an end to greenhouse gas production.

    student shipwright

    6.    The Hudson River Maritime Innovation Center, a multiyear proposal:  Year one, planning and facility(ies) identification) The Maritime Innovation Center will help the region’s maritime industry adopt new, and traditional maritime technologies, stimulate innovative entrepreneurship, promote knowledge transfer, business incubation, and workforce development to address maritime innovation challenges and opportunities.

    The Maritime Innovation Center will provide training for the next generation of shipwrights, longshore and logistics professionals, and mariners, sustain maritime industries, and assist the Hudson Valley region’s ports to modernize and become more climate adaptive, enhance post carbon logistic operations, promote green shipbuilding, and provide good jobs in the marine industry, and key lines of businesses, services, and products.

    Vision for the Center: The Hudson Valley will be a hub for resilient maritime businesses by creating a system of innovation that drives productive collaboration among non-profit, industry, academia, and local, county, and state government. Partnering with other maritime enterprises and organizations the Maritime Innovation Center will provide a physical place where professional practitioners, students, and apprentices can participate in theory and practice workshops for teaching and learning new maritime technologies while preserving the skills of the past to serve a carbon constrained future. 

    Focus:  The Center will focus on marine technology, and marine policy. Attendees should expect to spend time on ships and in shipyards in all seasons with the Innovation Center’s business and public partners. The Innovation Center will work to develop authentic activities on and around, ports and the river that create a sense of responsibility to the Hudson River and develop a new generation of maritime advocates, workers, and decision-makers who know how to use their heads, hearts, and hands. 

    It will be designed to help those who participate discover their interests and passions, not just prepare them for tests. At its core, the is about inspiring personal growth through craftsmanship, community, and maritime tradition.  Paraphrasing the title of Transition Town Rob Hopkins’ book, The Hudson River Maritime Innovation Center will be the embodiment of the “Power of Just Doing Stuff.”  

    Floating Office Rotterdam

    Facility, structure, and location: A new or climate adapted historic shoreside building(s), a vessel like the Floating Hospital Ship (Now moored in the Rondout Creek), or a floating facility like the Floating Office Rotterdam will be built, adapted, or restored, and modernized into a LEED-certified, “future proofed,” and environmentally friendly facility. It will include a mix of classrooms and working space for incubators, accelerators, and anchor tenants along with fabrication and event space. The facility will be a “Living Structure” with advanced sustainability and resiliency features.

    This center will benefit the region and the maritime community in several ways: 

    • Creating new employment opportunities for young people, and retraining experienced workers in the participating startups and established maritime businesses
    • Building the region’s status as a center for excellence in the maritime economy in a carbon constrained future.
    • Elevating awareness of entrepreneurs and stimulating confidence in the maritime industry to create new (and renewed) products and services 
    • Creating new opportunities for established area businesses to develop relationships with early-stage companies
    • Nurturing the next generation of diverse, inclusive, and representative maritime workforce with technological expertise and access to “green,” living-wage jobs as mariners, ship and boat builders, logistics specialists, welders, woodworkers, riggers, sailmakers, and battery and solar electric propulsion installers, and maintenance techs among others.

    Recommendation 2. Converting ICE vehicles to EVs/ZEVs:

    There is very little disagreement that EVs/ZEVs are the future of the automobile and light truck industry.  Over the lifetime of a ZEV the carbon footprint is significantly less than an internal combustion vehicle.  One huge problem given short shrift in the Scope is – what happens to all those ICE vehicles that get traded in?  Normally the vehicles whether sold privately or traded into a dealer will be resold and can operate for tens of thousands of miles more with the same or increased emissions.  Even if all ICE vehicles are taken out of service in New York by a certain date, those vehicles will be sold in another state or overseas, so there will be no net reduction in emissions for the life of those vehicles.

    ICE to EV conversion

    Subsidize the ICE to EV,ZEV, alternative fuel conversion business in New York:

    Presently ICE to EV conversions are limited to specialty custom businesses for customers with “classic” or “performance” cars, and some kits sold to DIY mechanics.  The process can range in price from less than $10 thousand to more than $100 thousand.  However, if New York made the decision to subsidize/incentivize new conversion businesses, re/training mechanics, and provide tax credits and other incentives to vehicle owner “first adaptors” that brought the cost down to less than the price of a new ZEV there are several overlapping benefits.  Many people like their present cars and light trucks and may resist buying a new, expensive EV that feels, looks, and drives differently than their present vehicle. 

    Working with NYSERDA, NYSDOT, NYSDEC, NGO’s and other relevant businesses, institutions, and federal agencies initiate demonstration projects:

    • Municipalities, counties, and state agencies decarbonize their fleets
    • BOCES training and retraining programs for conversion specialists, for independent mechanics and dealer employees
    • “Cash” for engines, exhaust systems, fuel tanks, and accessories for more than scrap value.
    • Computerized supply chain for used and new motors, batteries, brake vacuum pumps, power steering, electric heaters, seat heaters, EV adaptable air conditioning, and regenerative braking systems.
    • Subsidies and tax advantages for electric motor and battery manufacturers to relocate to New York.
    • Work with vehicle producers to provide components for conversion, E.g. Ford Lightning parts for Ford ICE pickups.
    • Incentivize dealers to convert ICE trade ins to EV’s
    • Incentivize School districts to convert diesel school buses to EVs and alternative diesel.
      • When we consider emissions from electric school buses, it is important to remember that the population most exposed to diesel school bus emissions are children. Children are especially vulnerable to the health effects of air pollution.  
    • Incentivize fleet operators and car rental businesses to buy conversions or set up conversion facilities
    • Incentivize farmers to convert diesel tractors and other ICE vehicles to alternative diesel and EVs.
    • Incentivize police, fire, and emergency departments to convert existing ICE fleets.
    • Set regulations and standards and train inspectors for both professional and DIY conversions
    • Prohibit the exportation of functioning ICE vehicles from New York to other States or overseas.
    • Provide subsidies and incentives for “fryer fat” to biodiesel conversion facilities.
    • Provide subsidies for biodigesters for biogas from organic waste facilities.

    Recommendation 3. Improved and Free Transit:

    Public Transportation Improves Commuters Productivity

    Free Public Transit enhances all these benefits:

    Tallinn, Estonia made international headlines when it became the first capital city in the world to introduce free public transport for its residents in 2013. With a population of almost half a million, the municipality undertook the measure to make access to public transport more equitable and for the perceived economic benefits.

    “We wanted to improve social mobility and stimulate the local economy by getting people out and about on the evenings and weekends,” says Allan Alaküla, Head of Tallinn’s EU Office and spokesperson for the scheme.

    Surveys conducted by the city in 2010 and in 2011 indicated that ticket costs had become the main barrier to increasing usage of public transport, which was in turn hindering the city’s broader economic development.

    Island Transit has been a fare-free bus system since its founding in 1987. You don’t need a ticket, cash, or coins to ride the bus, which makes bus transportation a very easy and convenient way to travel around Island County. Just hop on and go. Bus service is funded through 9 tenths of 1% of Island County’s local sales tax and supplemented by state and federal grants.

    Stinger Anderson got hooked on riding the bus after a colleague showed him how. He loves the tradeoffs including more time and money to spend in other ways.

    Recommendation 4. Demand Responsive Transportation (DRT):

    When it comes to improving public transportation in rural areas—flexibility is key. The first step is to provide an easy and efficient way for more people to access public transportation. On-Demand Public transportation, also known as Demand-Responsive Transportation (DRT) provides a way to increase the geographical coverage of a traditional public transit service. This means vehicles can cover a larger service area and reach more passengers. By utilizing DRT technology to improve fleet efficiency and give passengers a way to book public transportation—Councils, Fleet Operators and Transit Agencies in rural communities can easily improve their Public Transportation offering.[vi]

    Recommendation 5. Electrification of commuter, interstate, and municipal buses:

    Mass transit is the antidote to climate change,” MTA Chairman and CEO Janno Lieber said at a Midtown press conference, adding that transit avoids putting 17 million metric tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere annually (e.g., by keeping people out of cars). Transportation is the second-largest contributor of greenhouse-gas emissions in New York, after buildings.

    Close to 95% of commuter intra and interstate buses are diesel powered.  Some municipalities are transitioning to hybrid and electric buses, but the Plan should include regulation, incentives, and subsidies for the conversion of all diesel-powered buses.  The MTA has an electrification program but only a very small percentage of its fleet is electric. 

    The MTA now deploys 1,300 hybrid gas-electric buses, 399 of which sometimes operate solely on electric power in an “EV mode.” It pledges to purchase only electric buses by 2029. New York State budgeted $1.1 billion for buying 500 electric buses in the 2020-2024 capital plan.  This goal must be ramped up and speeded up and should include all municipal and county transit systems in the
    State.

    In the Portland, OR metro area, TriMet says it has cut its carbon emissions by more than 50% in the last six months by transitioning to renewable diesel and renewable electricity. It’s also trying to grow the number of electric buses in service.

    According to the Sierra Club’s Zero Emission Bus Fact Sheet:

    • EV buses already have lower comparative lifetime costs than diesel buses and CNG buses, and costs continue to drop rapidly.
      • Government estimates of zero emission bus prices sharply decline as advances in battery manufacturing and increased demand drive down costs. By 2025an electric bus is expected to cost $480,000, equal to or less than the cost of a new diesel vehicle.
    • Locked In O&M savings can then be used to expand the EV bus fleet, generating further savings
      • Electric buses also have substantially lower operating and maintenance (O&M) expenses as compared to their diesel and CNG alternatives. With an electric or hydrogen fuel cell bus, there are no oil changes or emissions tests, fewer parts that can break, and less wear on braking systems. The average lifetime maintenance cost for an electric bus is just $.60/mile.
    • EV Buses provide significant reductions in tailpipe and greenhouse gas emissions
      • It is also important to consider where these emission reductions will occur. Transit buses tend to operate in heavily populated urban areas and suburban corridors. Pollution from these sources falls directly upon the surrounding communities and commuters.

    Anecdotally there are no electric interstate buses operating in or to and from New York.  This provides an additional opportunity to convert diesel and natural gas buses to alternative diesel and EV’s.  See Solution 2.

    The Germany-based company FlixBus ran an electric bus pilot recently from Seattle to Eugene. The company purchased Greyhound in October, but it has been steadily expanding the U.S. market for intercity travel since it landed here in 2018.

    Recommendation 6. Electrification and solarization of freight and passenger trains[vii]

    Trains are one of the most efficient and sustainable form of transport.  Worldwide around 75% of trains have been electrified, while 25% still use fossil fuels. The bad news is that even electric locomotives use a partially polluting mix. The Council should set specific timetables for the electrification of all commuter and freight trains in New York and calculate the solar and other alternative electric power generation needed to accomplish this.

    • Continue electrification of diesel branches of commuter rail
    • Require that electricity be generated from non-fossil fuel sources
    • Working with NYSERDA provide grants to encourage the development of solar electric[viii] and fuel cell powered commuter and freight trains. 
    • Solarize all commuter rail stations (for trains, EV’s, and E-bikes) and create charging stations at rail maintenance yards.
    • Working with the Federal Railroad Administration and the NYSDOT begin the electrification of all freight/cargo trains in New York State. 
    • If electrification is not feasible research the use of hydrogen fuel cells, direct burning of green hydrogen or biogas or biodiesel in diesel/electric train engines and switching modes from rail to maritime. See Recommendation 1.

    Recommendation 7. Improved bicycle and E-bike transportation opportunities:

    Cargo E-bike

    Although electric bicycles didn’t receive much attention during the COP26— to the chagrin of some sustainability mobility advocates — 2021 was the year they found a more welcoming home around the world. An analysis by Business Research  estimated global e-bike sales at $36.5 billion for the year, a compound annual growth rate of more than 12 percent over 2020. Within three years, revenue could reach $53.3 billion, the market research firm predicts.

    E-Bikes for commuting and first and first and last mile logistics:

    • According to calculations touted by a legislative proponent of this idea, California Congressman Jimmy Panetta, if e-bikes handled many short-distance trips — particularly for commuting — currently traveled by cars, it would cut emissions by 12 percent.
    • While e-bike proponents generally talk up the benefits for individuals and commuters, the format also holds substantial promise when it comes to last-mile delivery, especially in urban environments where tricycles or quadricycles powered by pedal assist/battery could be a practical alternative to trucks and vans.

    Commuting, recreation, local shopping, and first and last mile logistics using E-bikes and trikes will have significant public and private benefits:

    • Improved health
    • Manufacturing, assembly, maintenance, and sales contribute economic benefits to the communities in which they are located.
    • Improves over all fuel efficiency
    • Reduces air pollution if E-bike batteries are charges from alternative power sources.
    • reduces road congestion
    • Improves individual and community mobility
    • Provides a more equitable transportation system

    Next steps:

    NYSERDA grants and state, county, and municipal subsidies and incentives for the manufacturing, sales, maintenance, and infrastructure for both recreational and commercial uses of E-bikes that include but are not limited to:

    • BOCES and other training facilities for E-bike builders, repair technicians, and sales.
    • Incentives for the development of E-bike, motor, and battery manufacturing facilities in New York
    • Dedicated bike lanes for rural and urban roads
    • Charging infrastructure and bike rental facilities at rail and bus stations and workplaces.
    • Employee incentives for use of E-bikes for commuting. Establishing a benefit that lets employers offer bike-commuting workers — those who do it regularly rather than occasionally a per month subsidy.
    • Higher tolls, congestion pricing, taxes, and incentives for the elimination of large trucks in urban centers
    • Traffic calming, street narrowing, de-paving, and xeriscaping.
    • The State working with other government divisions to change zoning to encourage and accommodate more bike friendly development patterns.
    • Multiple uses of “rail trails:”
      • Rail trails are primarily used by recreational hikers, bikers, and horseback riders.  A multi-use trail could accommodate small commercial E-bikes for cargo during certain hours and with some restrictions.
      • In many European countries bike paths, particularly in urban areas are shared with trolleys and other mass transit.  Even some of our existing rail/trails could be modified to accommodate inter-city trolley traffic along with the current uses safely.  The relatively small cost of replacing bridges and the use of self-contained battery electric rubber-tired trolleys would make this feasible.  The trails were originally designed for trains with the correct grade.

    Recommendation 8: Airships and electric aircraft

    Airship

    Airships are relatively inexpensive, they can carry a substantial amount of cargo, and they are significantly more environmentally friendly than their heavier-than-air relatives. Once thought to have passed into memory, airships are having something of a renaissance.

    • Over a decade ago, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) called specifically for cargo operators to embrace dirigibles to meet environmental targets. An airship is estimated to produce 80 to 90% fewer emissions than a conventional aircraft.

    Heavy Lift Cargo Airships:

    •             Made of aluminum frames- lightweight, solid, and proven
    •             Vertical take-off and landing
    •             Operates in strong front & cross wind conditions (50 Knots)
    •             Needs NO airport infrastructure/ground crew – operates on any flat space
    •             Burns 80 – 90% less fuel than equivalent aircraft
    •             Flies at 150-220 mph

    •             Costs 80-90% less than equivalent payload aircraft to purchase and operate
    •             Rivals in cost with truck or rail (point to point)
    •             At least 40 years working life expected

     Short Haul Passenger Airships, More environmentally friendly air travel:

    Airship journeys would take around the same time as airplane travel once getting to and from the airport is considered, however they would be a more environmentally friendly option. The airships generate a much smaller carbon footprint than airplanes. The CO2 footprint per passenger on its airship would be about 4.5kg compared with about 53kg via jet plane. Airships are ‘ideally suited to inter-city mobility applications like Seattle to Vancouver or Buffalo to New York City, at a tiny fraction of the emissions of current air options.

    With new flexible solar panels made part of the skin of the airship, and new electric motor and lightweight battery technology, not only could airship travel become a part of New York’s transportation infrastructure, but with the appropriate subsidies and incentives, manufacturers could be encouraged to relocate manufacturing to the State. 

    Electric Airplanes:

    Half of all global flights are shorter than 500 miles. That’s the sweet spot for electric aircraft. Fewer moving parts, less maintenance, and cheap(er) electricity means costs may fall by more than half to about $150 per hour For airlines, this makes entirely new routes now covered by car and train possible (and profitable) thanks to lower fuel, maintenance, and labor costs.

    Electric propulsion nearly solves another problem for aviation: carbon emissions. Aviation emits more than 2%  of the world’s CO2 emissions, and it may reach nearly a quarter by mid-century. With no alternative fuel ready to leave the ground, and the number of air passengers set to double by 2035, electricity may offer the industry its best way forward in a climate-constrained world.

    Conclusion:

    As New York sails into an uncertain, but surely dangerous, climate crisis, we can move steadily away from reliance on increasingly undependable fossil fuels, giant transnational companies, and international finances.  We can build energy, food, and economic redundancies into local communities to buffer them against international and national shortages and systems collapses. We can invest in our neighborhoods and our neighbors, working together to create “too small to fail” Main Street businesses, non-profits and local governments that strive in union to serve their communities and the people.

    None of this will insure us totally against the dangers ahead, but preparedness will give our state resilience and staying power. By acting now with foresight and hard work, we can care for each other, reinvesting in people and the land, creating a future for the Hudson Valley that emphasizes Earth Care, People Care and Fair Share.

    We can create organizational and institutional structures that are sustainable, endowed with ethical values that serve all citizens not only a privileged elite.  The emphasis will not be on blind, reckless progress at all cost, but on the creation of an equitable society that avoids resource depletion while fostering slow growth, and most importantly, hope for everyone, including the most vulnerable people and species. 

    Appendix 1. Low/No Carbon Maritime Resources:

    • International Windship Association: “The International Windship Association (IWSA) facilitates and promotes wind propulsion for commercial shipping worldwide and brings together all parties in the development of a wind-ship sector to shape industry and government attitudes and policies.”
      • Fairtransport : For 10 years we have shipped cargo across the Atlantic by the power of the wind alone!
    • Hudson River Maritime Museum: The Wooden Boat School was founded by the Hudson River Maritime Museum in 2015 to preserve the maritime craft traditions of the Hudson Valley and to teach a hands-on interpretation of the living history of the Hudson River.
    • Good Work Institute: The Good Work Institute’s mission is to cultivate, connect, and support a network of local community members who are fostering resilience and regeneration in the Hudson Valley.
    • Post Carbon Institute
    • New Dawn Traders Sail Cargo Alliance: New Dawn Traders is co-creating the Sail Cargo Alliance (SCA) to support a new and growing community interested in shipping ethical cargo under sail. Beyond building viable trade for these sailing vessels, the SCA is committed to setting the highest standards for ethics across the supply chain. This is an alliance of ship owners, brokers, producers and anyone interested in working together in a healthy transport culture.
    • Drawdown: Project Drawdown gathers and facilitates a broad coalition of researchers, scientists, graduate students, PhDs, post-docs, policy makers, business leaders and activists to assemble and present the best available information on climate solutions in order to describe their beneficial financial, social and environmental impact over the next thirty years.
    • Low Tech Magazine : Low-tech Magazine questions the blind belief in technological progress, and talks about the potential of past and often forgotten knowledge and technologies when it comes to designing a sustainable society. Interesting possibilities arise when you combine old technology with new knowledge and new materials, or when you apply old concepts and traditional knowledge to modern technology.
    • Zero Emission Ship Technology Association: Our Mission is to prevent catastrophic climate impacts by assisting commercial shipping to reduce emissions on a steep trajectory.
    • ECOCLIPPER: We are establishing a professional shipping company that offers emission free transport and travel, by making use of engine-less sailing ships. The start-up crew combines top maritime expertise that is relevant to the sailing cargo industry, decades of experience in business development and sound management expertise.
    • Sustainable Hudson Valley: Sustainable Hudson Valley’s mission is to speed up, scale up, jazz up and leverage progress against climate change, creating communities where people and nature thrive. With a wide range of partners,
    • Revolution Rickshaws: Established in 2005, Revolution Rickshaws is a live-electric urban vehicle (LUV) systems & services enterprise based in New York City. Revolution researches, develops, and maintains LUVs in partnership with multiple world-class industry brands including Cycles Maximus, our long-time bikemobile manufacturer and collaborator, to deliver optimal goods and services to market.
    • Sail Cargo Inc.: Our mission is to prove the value of clean shipping
      • Eliminating fossil fuels from the maritime sector is achievable by using advanced technology and simple techniques. We combine innovative, clean technologies with readily-available, low-cost, natural systems to create solutions for a range of needs: from supporting vulnerable coastal communities to moving commodities at global scale.
    • Original content, curated news, and articles: The Center for Post Carbon Logistics
    • Small-Scale Sail Freight On Coastal And Inland Waters, Author Steven Woods: Sail Freight has slowly worked its way into the realm of sustainability discourse as a way of reducing emissions from transportation, providing logistical solutions using the emissions free power of the wind and technologies proven effective for over 5000 years. This attitude toward Sail Freight and transportation in general has some merits, but none of these discussions seem to have examined the issue of readopting sail freight at scale.
    • New Age of Sail looks to slash massive maritime carbon emissions: If ocean shipping were a country, it would be the sixth-largest carbon emitter, releasing more CO2 annually than Germany. International shipping accounts for about 2.2% of all global greenhouse gas emissions, according to the U.N. International Maritime Organization.
    • Industries for Small Communities, Arthur E. Morgan: Morgan’s goal, through his life’s work and in the 1953 publication specifically, was to shift the prevailing mindset regarding small-scale industry. Then, as now, what Morgan termed “bigness” was glorified and small communities were rapidly losing young people to urban centers. Still, he knew that small businesses existed across the country, and that the communities that housed them could be vibrant and fulfilling places to live.

    Appendix 2.  Eriemax and Electric Clipper

    Eriemax, 80’ canal, river, and coastal sail freighter, Geoff Uttmark design

    Electric Clipper, 180-200’ short sea and trans-oceanic sail freighter, Derek Ellard design


    [1] Astroturfing is the practice of masking the sponsors of a message or organization (e.g., political, advertising, religious or public relations) to make it appear as though it originates from and is supported by grassroots participants.

    [2] The Council on behalf of the State must admit culpability.  The For the last fifty years the State of New York, the Governors, departments, the legislature, and its congressional representatives have had ample information, data, and scientific evidence of the impacts of a changing climate on the environment of New York, including but not limited to the impacts of  subsidies for road building over rail, urban sprawl, air and water pollution, and squandering of opportunities to mitigate or begin to adapt to the climate crisis that has been exacerbated by transportation policy and actions.

    [3] The Schooner Apollonia, Eriemax/ShipShares,  The Center for Post Carbon Logistics, , Sustainable Hudson Valley, RevX, and Solar Sal Boats, Martin, Ottaway, van Hemmen &Doyle, Inc,

    [4]The M-87 Route is the Hudson River, connecting commercial navigation channels such as the Erie Canal, ports, and harbors from New York City to Albany, NY. It spans eastern New York State. It connects to the M-90 Route at Albany, NY and the M-95 Route at New York City.

    [5] MARAD defines a small port as a coastal seaport, Great Lakes, or inland river port to and from which the average annual tonnage of cargo handled during the 3 calendar years immediately preceding the time of application is less than 8,000,000 short tons.

    [6] https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1J8PlvNw8ZvBGocHFcGX_Fj0xmy3gyn1WvveK_cb7OHE/edit#gid=899225407

    [7] Yildiz, F., Coogler, K. L., & Amador, R. (2015). Conversion of a gasoline powered boat to a hybrid electric boat. Journal of Engineering Technology, 32(1), 52-63. https://www.proquest.com/openview/cfd13c6dbb26ed0fdebc07560b680916/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=32062

    [8] Caprara, G., Martirano, L., & Balleta, C. (2020, June). Preliminary analysis of the conversion of a leisure boat into a battery electric vehicle (BEV). IEEE Xplore. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/9160492


    [i] Issues We Address:

    Looking forward rationally at all the indicators, the “business as usual” choice takes us down a road to cataclysmic food and energy shortages, transportation disruption, infrastructure failure, inundation from sea level rise, financial meltdowns and its attendant social disarray.

    Possible response strategies:

    We do These Things

    Preserve, knowledge:

    • The Center will house a traditional knowledge data base, library, and a pre/post carbon tool, technology, and machinery collection.  This activity is an ambitious effort to preserve, restore and promote the re-use of traditional skills.

    Movement Building, advocacy:

    • The Center promotes maritime, and first and last mile technology necessary for moving goods and people from place to place in a carbon constrained future.
    • The Center is an advocate for existing and emerging low carbon shipping and post carbon transportation businesses and organizations.
    • The Center is an advocate for appropriately sized working waterfronts in small to mid-sized ports throughout the the Hudson Valley, NY Harbor, Canals, and the Atlantic Coast.
    • The Center advocates for a transition that people will embrace as a collective adventure, as a common journey, as something positive.   Paraphrasing the title of Transition Town Rob Hopkins’ book, The Center for Post Carbon Logistics will be the embodiment of the “Power of Just Doing Stuff.”

    Train, individuals and organizations:

    • Partnering with other enterprises and organizations The Center will provide a physical place where professional practitioners and apprentices can participate in theory and practice workshops for preserving the skills of the past to serve the future
    • The Center will host regional, national, and international conferences on post carbon logistics, traditional skills, and sail freight
    • The Center will provide educational opportunities and creative, implementable, real world solutions to the 21st century environmental, economic, and social crises enabling people to work locally to transition our communities and bio-region away from a fossil fuel-based economy to a “restorative economy,” one that is human-scaled, embraces alternative locally based energy, and that is less extractive.

    [ii] Green Shipping Corridor:

    In April 2022 the US Department of State put out a Fact Sheet, Green Shipping Corridors.  That said in part:

    In support of the effort to achieve global net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by no later than 2050, and in support of the effort to achieve zero greenhouse gas emissions from the international shipping sector by the same year, the United States is charting a course to advance domestic and international green shipping corridors.

    [iii] This PC3PL providers is a vital part of maritime based supply chain management. 

    • Procurement:  ordering and receiving goods from purveyors in the supply chain. 
      • Order fulfillment and Consolidation: Receiving an order from customers and arranging for the orders to be completed and shipped.[iii] PC3PL will combine goods from multiple shipments into one shipment so they can be transported together.
      • Storage: Providing temporary storage for goods in warehouses or similar facilities.
      • Transportation and Distribution:[iii] Arranging for consolidation, management, and transportation of goods from the producer, to the first and last mile provider, drayage[iii] to and from a temporary storage or warehouse to the water-based transport of goods and point of destination. 
      • Moving goods between methods of transport

    To support this new logistics model certain data, need to be collected and analyzed based on previous and anticipated activities, this information includes but is not limited to:

    PC3PL will also offer a range of supplementary services including IT, inventory management, and reverse logistics,[iii] and tracking of goods using GPS and Internet of Things (IoT) devices

    [iv]The Marine Byways and Resilient Small Port Toolkit products will include but not be limited to:

    1. A review and analysis of the pros and cons of previous short sea and Hudson River maritime cargo transport projects including the Vermont Sail Freight ProjectAlbany Express Barge service, The Hudson River Corridor Foodway Project, and the project cargo business of the NY State Marine Highways Co.  
    2.  A compendium of pier/dock/bulkhead and navigation conditions, using field checks, existing and new photographs, and satellite images
    3. A review of New York City’s “Delivering Green” Plan to determine the location of appropriately sized small ship docks and piers, and accessibility for low/no carbon first and last mile logistics providers.
    4. Make available, existing and newly created GIS maps and charts of small and medium sized ports throughout the M-87 Marine Highway System for the use of mariners and port operators
    5.  port gazetteers[iv]
    6. Financing for port improvements
    7. Guidance for local communities to develop working waterfront zoning, deed restrictions, and easements
    8. links to sustainability and resilience resources.  
    9. links to local and regional naval architects, shipbuilders, and boat yards, as a resource for sail cargo and solar ferry entrepreneurs and public agencies with an interest in low/no carbon water transport of goods and people.
    10. A compendium of local, state, and federal agencies and what assistance they offer, and sources of funding for:
      1. planning assistance for small port improvements for low/no carbon commercial freight and passenger vessels.
      1. Assistance in the creation of working waterfront inventories
      1. Protecting existing working waterfronts through land conservation, easements, and deed restrictions.
      1. Building waterfront EV charging stations including electric boat and ship hook ups 
      1. Accommodate existing or potential low/no carbon first and last mile logistics providers, storage, and warehousing
      1.  Develop waterfront recreation compatible with port operations
      1. climate resilience projects, retreat strategies,
      1. wetlands and benthic habitat restoration/adaptation strategies,
      1. and sample Zoning ordinances to assist small port and riverfront towns to retain their water dependent businesses and ecological services. 

    [v] NYMTC Resiliency Planning

     NYMTC Freight Planning

    NYMTC Sustainability Planning

    NYMTC Regional Freight Report  

    Delivering Green, a NYC sustainable freight plan

    Final UCTC Year 2045 Long Range Transportation Plan

    Kingston NY Climate Action Plan 2030

    NY DEC Climate Action Plan

    (Mid) Hudson Regional Climate Action Strategy

    Rondout Riverport 2040

    Kingston, NY’s Weaving the Waterfront

    Scenic Hudson Sea Level Rise Reports,

    NY State Local Waterfront Revitalization Program

    National Working Waterfront Network

     Sustainable Working Waterfronts Toolkit 

    financial and port and docking information gathered by the Schooner Apollonia’s multi-port cargo operation,

    interviews with local, county, state, and federal transportation, and economic development agency officials,

    materials developed by non-governmental organizations,

    navigation, port, and logistics information from contemporary and historic sources (including the Hudson River Maritime Museum Collections)  

    Interviews with farmers, food processors, brewers, distillers, and small local manufacturers, makers, and logistics providers

    interviews with local, county, state, and federal transportation, agriculture, and economic development officials,

    materials developed by non-governmental organizations,

    navigation, port, and logistics information from contemporary and historic sources  

    [vi] DRT a form of shared private or quasi-public transport for groups traveling where vehicles alter their routes each journey based on particular transport demand without using a fixed route or timetabled journeys. These vehicles typically pick-up and drop-off passengers in locations according to passengers needs and can include taxis, buses or other vehicles.

    One of the most widespread types of demand-responsive transport (DRT) is to provide a public transport service in areas of low passenger demand where a regular bus service is not considered to be financially viable, such as rural and peri-urban areas. 

    [vii] Electric Trains vs. Diesel Trains:

    Though trains are more efficient than trucks, not all trains are equally efficient. Diesel-powered trains transfer about 30-35 percent of the energy generated by combustion to the wheels, while supplying electricity directly from an overhead powerline transfer about 95 percent of the energy to the wheels. Powering trains with electricity rather than diesel has several other benefits.

    • While prices of diesel fuel are currently low, many analysts predict that the long-term trend is for those prices to increase. Conversely, prices of electricity are falling with the fast-growing use of renewable energy sources. Even at current prices, with the energy conversion rates mentioned above, it is estimated that it is 50 percent less expensive to power a train by electricity than by diesel.
    • The cost of electric locomotive engines is about 20 percent less than diesel locomotive engines on the global market, and maintenance costs are 25-35 percent less than for diesel engines.
    • Eliminating diesel-powered locomotives would reduce air pollution including soot, volatile organic compounds, nitrogen oxides, and sulfur oxides, all of which affect public health as well as the environment. This is especially important as many railroads pass through urban areas. It would also reduce noise levels in cities, as well as traffic deaths due to trucks (rail freight causes only about one-eighth as many fatalities as truck freight per ton-mile).
    • Switching from diesel to electricity would also help address the challenge of replacing petroleum-based liquid transportation fuels with cleaner alternatives as we seek to lower our greenhouse gas emissions.

    [viii] Are solar trains feasible?

    In research focused on providing solar power to electric trains, it is enlightening how efficient this transportation mode can really be.  Electric trains are 50 percent to 75 percent less polluting than single-passenger cars and trucks and use comparably less energy per passenger-mile, according to a 2009 detailed analysis by Chester and Horvath.

    Electric trains are so efficient that a single 300-watt solar panel (about 4×6 feet) can provide up to 7,000 miles of an individual’s commuting miles per year, or 5 to 20 miles per day. The national average, based on National Transportation Database data on the efficiency of the various U.S. electric train systems, is about 4,000 miles per year for each 300-watt solar panel. One mile of train tracks can support 1 megawatt to 3 megawatts of solar panels, which can provide 2 million and 6 million passenger-miles of train travel.

    Wind power is another obvious option for powering electric trains with on-site renewables — where there are strong wind resources. Distributed wind has not taken off in the U.S. anywhere near to the degree that distributed solar has, but it could be a viable option in many circumstances, particularly where there are state rebates to offset the cost of wind turbines. Wind power in desirable locations is still cheaper than power from solar panels and can also complement solar power by producing power at night.

  • The Northeast Grain Race

    A Blog Post by Derek Ellard

    The Hudson River Maritime Museum, in cooperation with the Center for Post Carbon Logistics and the Northeast Grainshed Alliance, will be conducting a Grain Race in May of 2022. Contestants in four capacity categories will vie for the highest score when moving cargoes of grain from growers to producers and users such as brewers and maltsters across New England, New York, and New Jersey. Each Ton-Mile of cargo moved earns one point, but 5 points are lost for each liter of fuel, or 10 kWh of power taken from the grid.

    Based on the Great Grain and Tea Races of the 19th century, conducted by ships sailing from Australia and China to England, but adapted to facing the current climate crisis, this race is designed to add some drama and interest to the topics of local food systems and food transportation.

    Each contestant set can enter a single cargo voyage during the month of May 2022, using the indicated Google Form, which will be verified by a panel of judges. Winners will be published on the 15th of June, and prizes awarded thereafter.

    The rules and current Directory of Participants and Supporting Organizations can be accessed here. Those interested in participating can have themselves added to the directory through the provided contact link in the document, while those with questions can contact the Hudson River Maritime Museum for further information.

    Blog Post

    The Northeast Grain Race is many things, a history lesson, an “all things considered” invitation, a competition and an opportunity to make a difference but it also highlights another race – a race against time.  The world urgently needs initiatives like this to make us sit up and take a good look at what we all take for granted – the food in our local store and how it gets there. To put it bluntly, we must find better ways to put food on the table without destroying the farms that grow it, and recent disasters are surely stark reminders that we’re rapidly running out of time.  The good news is this is a race we can win, we can come out on top if we apply ourselves to this, The Race Of Our Lives. In our marine team, we have access to the best of history, the best technology and the combined expertise of the best Maritime Minds and Lateral Thinkers so the odds are good – we can win this one!

    This race could herald a new era as the seeds of a new ocean order come to fruition – history will be written. ) we are evolving to a point where we will wield real power. Power to initiate sensible change as we jointly reject the old obsolete ways of the past and embrace the new ways of the past – the abundant natural capital of wind and sun re-interpreted for the 21st century.

    The power to commission a new generation of better cargo ships, clean, efficient and profitable ships driven by wind and sun, is within our grasp. Our time is now.

    As an Australian member of this group of visionary minds, my own contribution is both modest yet my aims are global. The principles are simple – take the best of the old and press a big refresh button. Our small sailing ketches and cargo schooners would not, at first glance, look out of place moored to a 19th century wharf, but look closer and you will see that every single component of every one of our boats is upgraded. We’ll refine the time-honoured sailplans, upgrade all the gear and build in electric auxiliaries.  A new generation of sailmakers will weave their composite spells, new alloys like Scandium will be extruded for our spars and our underwater lines will cleave the waters with no oily scum in their wake.

    Every aspect of the power delivery systems is designed for efficiency. Form Energy’s new generation iron-air batteries show great promise as ballast with benefits, new pumps and fridge compressors will cut power consumption by half – Magtor take a bow, and hats off to the Alpha 311 creators for their innovative roadside wind generators, we have designated spaces for them on board. There’s high-performance, self-lubricating bearings for props, rudders and dagger boards. All this and up to 36 TEUs in the holds, that’s 800 tonnes or 1,400 cubic metres (49,440 cubic feet) in our new Schooner. Food on the table without trashing the trade routes.

    Our new wind ships are freighters, feeders and short sea traders with a good attitude, not afraid to exploit the best of the new but built on the solid, risk-averse foundations of the world’s maritime history, a history with a particularly rich vein running right through the North Eastern States

    This business model only takes us so far however, you are not going to power a full-sized container ship with solar panels over the cargo hatches but our C100 Ketch will generate 12kW on a good day and power the inboard electric engines in the calms to help keep the owner’s accountant happy. And there’s the business case in a nutshell – free fuel, there for the harnessing.  I’ll gladly leave the development of the mega ships to those best qualified for the job but America and indeed the whole planet will always need small ships, new generation zero-carbon square riggers for the trade winds and new schooners, sailing barges and cutters for the rivers, estuaries and islands.

    So what’s the big idea then? Where do we go from here?

    Back to future I say, and I take my cue from the amazing World War 2 Liberty Ship program initiated by good old-fashioned US entrepreneurs and an enlightened government applying Henry Ford’s mass-production techniques to the slipways. The current war threatens annihilation so we’d better get down to it. We need mass-produced sail and sun driven ships by the thousand. We will need the discipline and strategy of the military, the precision of robotics and the hard work of the Nation’s best shipwrights and we need them now.

    So what’s stopping us? Capital. Where there’s a will there’s a way and we have the will already. We need to pool our abundant resources, take a collective deep breath and speak up – loud and clear. It’s no longer a case of “THEY SHOULD DO SOMETHING!” Protest is past, action is present, WE will do something, our voices must ring out in the boardrooms of the powerful. The message is crystal clear, free fuel can no longer be ignored and the starting gun for the future-proof shipping race has already been fired – the winds of change are here!

    The author:

    Derek Ellard is an Australian boat builder and designer at Go Sail Cargo.  He has designed “purpose built” “electric clipper” sail cargo vessels ranging in size from 24’ to 180’.  Derek has been working with the Center for Post Carbon Logistics, The Schooner Apollonia, the Hudson River Maritime Museum, and Sustainable Hudson Valley as part of an effort to R&D. design, finance, and build 5 new ships including an ocean-going sail cargo vessel to be locally built in a Hudson Valley shipyard to complement the movement of goods and people to and from the Caribbean, New York Harbor, and the Hudson Valley in a carbon constrained future. Derek can be reached at derek@scruffie.com.

  • Sail Freight Revival

    Sail Freight Revival

    A Master’s Thesis by Steven Woods

    This article is a summary of the Steven Woods’ Master’s Thesis: “Sail Freight Revival: Methods of calculating fleet, cargo, and labor needs for supplying cities by sail.” Master’s Thesis. Prescott College, 2021. The full thesis can be read Here.

    Solar Electric USCG Inspected passenger vessel Solaris

    Steven Woods earned his master’s degree in Resilient and Sustainable Communities at Prescott College in 2021, with an undergraduate degree in History from LeMoyne College. He has worked in museums for over 20 years and is making a career transition to the sustainability field after 6 years in the US Airforce. He is presently the Solaris Coordinator at the Hudson River Maritime Museum.

    Ssil Freight Schooner Apollonia

    Sail Freight is an ancient, proven, and fuel-independent means of transportation for both cargo and people. At scale, it could easily provide a means of provisioning cities across the world with food and other essential goods, while avoiding the use of strategic materials such as lithium, cobalt, biofuels, solar panels, electricity, and copper which are needed for the land-based energy transition. The challenge of moving to a sustainable transportation system is of critical importance, and the need to maintain a sufficient transportation capacity for food is literally a matter of life and death.

    Sail Freight Vessel Tres Hombres

    Sail Freight has gained popularity and visibility as a means of near zero carbon transport, and justifiably so. As complex Sail Freight networks have existed for at least 4,000 years in the Mediterranean, and possibly as long as 40,000 years in the South Pacific, the art of sailing is not new, and does not require complex or energy intensive technologies. Once a sail freight vessel is launched, the carbon emissions from the vessel are nearly zero, and service lives can cover several decades. As 90% of the world’s commerce moves by sea, and modern container ships normally burn over 100 tons of heavy fuel oil per day on their voyages, sail freight seems a good means of cleaning up global commerce.

    Until recently, it seems no one has examined the scale at which sail freight must be adopted to fulfill these hopes and aspirations, nor has anyone looked at the auxiliary challenges of adopting sail freight, such as the capacity available to train windjammer sailors, build ships, and so on. Other challenges arise simultaneously to fleet capacity: Food systems and diets must change, warehouses be revived and staffed, superfluous shipping avoided, and foodsheds altered, while regulations change and physical infrastructure needs to be modified. Without a systems view of the whole readoption of sailing freight; any discussion thereof is unlikely to grasp the magnitude of the task at hand.

    Black Seal unloading in Brooklyn

    The first step in such a process is establishing a level of supply needed in a given city, which in our case with be the New York Metro Area. To survive, the city must have 2.5 kilograms of food per person daily. With a population of some 20,000,000 people, the New York Metro Area needs 50,000 metric tons of food per day, at a minimum, to prevent starvation. This gives us our daily requirement but does not give the full picture. A representative model of the NYMA Foodshed must be established, and the travel times from the food’s origin to destination must be calculated, alongside time for loading and unloading, as well as time for the ship to return to the origin for its next cargo.

    The table below gives one such model for the New York Metro Area, at two levels of supply, using relatively small vessels, and illustrates the challenge before us quite well.

    As can be seen, even at the lowest possible level of supply, it would require nearly 10,000 ships and 65,000 sailors to supply New York with food, and this without allowing time for crew rest, delays, or ship maintenance. At our current pace of launching Sail Freight Vessels, it would take near 44,500 years to build such a fleet. If we put all the shipyards in the US to work on the problem, however, it could be accomplished in as little as 13 years. While this feat would only be a start, as other cities will need their own fleets, these figures show the scale of the problem we are confronted with, and that it can in fact be solved quickly and effectively.

    Of course, ships without trained crews are useless. The time to train windjammer sailors must also be considered. With an average program able to train around 650 sailors in a given year, the number of training program years needed to train the NYMA fleet’s crew requirement would be some 100 years, though with 8 such programs running concurrently this could also be accomplished in less than 15 years. The chart below shows the relationship between training program years and shipyard years and demonstrates that training a sufficient number of sailors will likely take longer than the construction of a sufficient number of vessels for the mission at hand.

    sail training vessel

    These figures all rely on a “Survey Average Vessel” of 111.25 tons capacity, and 6.5 crew members on average. These would be relatively small vessels, and larger vessels will need fewer of both ships and crew to give the same Fleet Tonnage. It is likely in the beginning of sail freight’s revival that small vessels will be involved, both reclaimed and newly built, which will have larger crew requirements and lower tonnages than the model here portrays. It is worth taking a comprehensive look at the current sail training resources in the US and subsidizing the training of windjammer sailors and captains as soon as practicable.

    In the case of Sail Freight, fuel or energy efficiency is not applicable in the same way as with conventional transportation. The appropriate metric of efficiency is “Tons Per Sailor” as the major cost is labor. The higher the tons per sailor, the lower the cost of moving cargo becomes, and the large the vessel, the greater the tons per sailor. Further, this metric is effected by rig, as seen below.

    Sloops and Scchooners fore and aft rigs

    Through the intelligent choice of rig for specific applications, crew requirements can be brought down somewhat as larger vessels proliferate. Fore-and-Aft rigged vessels such as sloops, schooners, and brigantines generally have a smaller crew and are well suited to the coastal trading which will likely constitute much of a sail freight food movement system. Barks, Ships, and very large schooners will also likely see use on longer routes with far more cargo, but moderately sized crews.

    Other challenges are present for reviving sail freight. Without substantial changes bringing the external costs of road and fossil fueled transport into the economic equations through weight-distance, tire, fuel, and carbon taxes, sail freight will remain economically uncompetitive excepting on very long routes with high-value cargos. As the price of fossil fueled transport rises, this competitiveness will even out, and short sea shipping under sail will most likely gain traction in the economic mix.

    truck pollution

    There are significant benefits to moving to sail freight for climate policy which makes the case for its adoption despite these challenges. It has been calculated that at a minimum, more than 220,000 tons of CO2e could be eliminated from US transportation emissions through supplying the NYMA with food via Sail Freight. This model assumes that all food is brought via 10,000 TEU container ships, which can move some 380 ton-miles on a liter of diesel fuel. Trucking, by comparison, nets only 1.58, while trains can get up to about 118-ton miles per liter of diesel fuel. If the latter number was calculated for trucking emissions instead of conventional maritime transport, it would be some 21 billion liters of diesel fuel and 63,560,087,101 Tons of CO2e avoided annually.  This amounts to some 362,000 barrels of oil per day.

    pollution from ships

    Alongside these benefits, shifting cargo to waterways will reduce congestion, wear, and tear on highway and rail systems, thus likely increasing the overall fuel efficiency of these same systems. Biofuels made from food wastes will be freed for use in supplying cities without nearby port facilities and demands on the grid for electrical power to fuel electric trucks will be lessened. In addition, the number of electric trucks to be built will also decline, making electrification faster and simpler in the long run.

    Vermont Sail Freight Ceres

    There are other advantages to Sail Freight which are less obvious than the environmental benefits and the challenge of training crews and building ships. For example, small vessels can be built inexpensively and with little needed in the way of facilities. Small ships can be built in the tradition of the Farmer’s Ships of the Aland Islands, which was effectively a combination of bot community supported agriculture and community supported shipping. Ceres of the Vermont Sail Freight Project is an example of just such a vessel, which made several successful voyages from Lake Champlain to New York City for the mere cost of some $20,000. With more advanced designs becoming available, planned for mass production and low cost in the style of the liberty ships of World War Two, these higher-capital ships will be in financial reach of cooperatives all around the four coastlines of the US and abroad.

    Schooner Apollonia

    This more democratic ownership model for transport, independent of fossil fuels, removes major costs for farmers in rural areas, especially as the cost of fuel and trucking rises. This can have the effect of lowering or stabilizing food prices for citizens while keeping more money moving to farmers and sailors. This is of mutual benefit to both city and countryside, clearly, but also reduces the power of banks and major corporations in both the transportation and food systems.

    NYC Foodshed

    Despite these benefits, there are many social and cultural adaptations which must be made to adapt to a Sail Freight future. The idea of constantly having fresh produce, in the off-season from 3,000 and more miles away will have to be abandoned. Diets must become more regionalized and localized, and the use of preserved foods instead of fresh in agricultural off seasons will become the rule. With innovative growing techniques, green houses, and other adaptations, there are likely to be small supplies of fresh foods in off seasons, but New York is unlikely to have shiploads of citrus arrive in good condition from Tampa after over a week in transit. Citrus juices, jams, preserves, and other shelf-stable confections will have to take the place of these foods where possible, and processing happen near the point of origin.

    Next-day delivery will be impossible, and Just-In-Time delivery systems will be a thing of the past, replaced by acres of warehousing. wastes reduced, and material goods designed for repair instead of disposal. Superfluous Single-Use items such as coffee cups, plates, flatware, and bags should be banned on both environmental and logistical grounds. If every member of the NYMA used a single disposable coffee cup weighing 18 grams per day, the mass of cargo would amount to over 360 tons daily, or 131,400 tons of cargo in the year. If manufactured in Shanghai, 368 Survey Average Ships would need to be in constant motion between the two ports to maintain this entirely unnecessary practice.

    Sail Freight Vessel Tres Hombres
    Neoline Sail Freight

    The future of Sail Freight is promising. Through the combination of modern knowledge and technology with proven older forms, a sustainable way of keeping cities alive can be created. While the challenge of building a Sail Freight future is certainly not easy, it can be done if we put our money, our time, and our backs to the task at hand. So doing could significantly alter the course of climate adaptations and climate change mitigation, provide hundreds of thousands of jobs, and democratize the economy in many beneficial ways. Given the gravity of our situation and the benefits to be gained, the case for Sail Freight should be clear to all.

  • Rondout Riverport 2040

    A Post Carbon Gateway to the Hudson Valley and the World

     A Comprehensive Plan for a Working Waterfront and the Transportation of Goods and People in a Carbon Constrained Future

    Summary:

    Rondout Riverport 2040 proposes a pragmatic, positive, and prosperous vision for the near future in which the communities of Kingston and Esopus are enriched by a transformed port, boasting a shoreline synergy of leading-edge maritime commerce and working waterfront technologies that profit and engage individuals, businesses and communities, allowing for an equitable transition beyond fossil fuels, as together we forge a vital and vibrant economic bond with the greater Hudson Valley Bioregion.

    Over the next twenty years, Rondout Riverport 2040 offers the communities of Kingston and Esopus an extraordinary opportunity and vision for remaking and transforming the Rondout Creek and Hudson River Working Waterfront.

    Rondout Riverport 2040 provides a trailblazing and sustainable development template for our community, harnessing and enhancing our region’s widely shared prosperity, even as we enter into an economically demanding carbon-constrained future.

    The Riverport in 2040, as envisioned here, will offer far more capacity, while being significantly more compact in land area, more robust, and resilient than the current patchwork of diffuse land uses found on today’s waterfront. The core mission of tomorrow’s port is the post carbon maritime transport of goods and people up and down the Hudson River and beyond. The Riverport, as imagined here, is designed to attract shipping, distribution, commerce, hospitality, and craft businesses, creating a dynamic collaboration and nexus for optimized local and regional market productivity. The result: an economically, culturally and environmentally resilient post carbon working waterfront — a gateway to the Hudson Valley and world.

    Think of Rondout Riverport 2040 as a signature project benefiting from the creative contributions of its many partner organizations, local governments, and institutions to address and transcend the near future threats of sea level rise; increasingly turbulent extreme weather events; and unexpected global, national and regional economic shocks. The port’s versatility will depend on the linking of its economic opportunities with environmental restoration and sustainable commerce. Embracing this multi-generational project will also be a source of inspiration for broader long-term action on climate change.

    We can best accomplish these visionary waterfront goals via an integrated “placemaking” approach. Placemaking provides a method for answering critical questions: What are the best ways to mobilize and coordinate our many community assets? How do we effectively draw on public and private partnerships to creatively identify opportunities? How can we successfully coordinate our implementation efforts? And where do we find the resources needed to accomplish our vision for a transformed riverport?

    We don’t have to wait until 2040 to start benefiting. Communities can begin now, as they participate in a vigorous planning process, while taking key steps for future proofing our shoreline against the harms threatened by a more politically, economically, and environmentally chaotic planet in a post-carbon future. The path to a bright, sustainable future starts with community engagement and data collection to build an actionable vision for the Rondout Riverport, a vision that incorporates a proud sense of community and place, local stewardship, and widely shared economic opportunity. The choice is ours.

     A Vision for Rondout Riverport Working Waterfront, circa 2040

    Imagine: It is a hot, late autumn day along the Hudson in 2040. From the rooftop of a trading house in Kingston, a ship spotter sees the topmast of a large sloop. The sloop signals a waiting solar tug, the Augustin Mouchot, which tows the engineless sailing ship toward a berth in the newly completed Rondout Riverport Inner Harbor.  

    The sloop, the Pete Seeger, is loaded with high-value cargo from abroad, transferred in New York Harbor from the oceangoing post carbon Eco-Clipper, Jorne Langelaan. The mixed freight consists of Caribbean fair-trade coffee and cocoa beans bound for the Hudson Valley’s roasters and chocolatiers, along with preserved tropical fruits and rum destined for local Kingston stores. The Seeger’s crew put a harbor furl on the hemp cloth sails, even as other crew members ready the on-board cargo gear. The sailors open hatches and set up the onboard cargo boom which will do most of the heavy lifting. The crew can also access the harbor’s floating cargo cranes for heavier or bulkier freight. 

    These locally trained young seafarers are in good spirits, looking forward to spending some time ashore, and to a few drinks of locally made brew, cider, and spirits. Like any sailors, they are also hungry and ready for a good meal at a tavern — the local fare includes dishes harvested from the Hudson’s new artisan fishery and from oyster beds seeded in shallows created by former piers and abandoned roads, submerged downriver over the last 20 years due to climate change’s rising seas and increasing river levels. After dinner the sailors walk along the sea-life-encrusted seawall, built from repurposed concrete and stone from former waterfront byways, buildings, and piers inundated by the Hudson’s rising waters.

    A longshore crew, warehouse workers, drovers and their electric-assist people-powered tricycles and wagons converge at the waterfront’s new storm-proofed floating dock — which rises and falls with surging tides. Cargo surveyors assist with the unloading of the coastal Schooner, Sam Merrett down from Maine with a load of lobsters. The square foremast tops’le Schooner Kevin Kerr Jones is unloading citrus from Savannah. Other stevedores are loading the solar electric Feeney shipyard built canal barge David Borton, bound for ports up the Hudson River with a final destination at Buffalo. Some smaller solar barges are loading for Port Jervis, then on to the newly opened Delaware and Hudson Canal. 

    The (s)low tech Rondout Riverport is modern and efficient. The port is no longer dependent on prohibitively expensive fossil fuels, nor the notoriously unreliable overseas energy supply chain. Instead, Roundout makes the best use of old and new — tried and true 19th century technology blended seamlessly with 21st century solar and battery electric gear and vehicles. More people are at work today on the waterfront than at any time since the 1920s; there are more warehouses and trading houses, shipbuilding, repair facilities, and docking facilities than at any time in the Rondout’s nautical history.

    Bronze foundry

    Just behind the waterfront are coopers using sustainably harvested local oak,  sail and ropemakers utilizing New York hemp; forges and foundries use concentrated solar heat to form bronze fittings. Riggers are hard at work in ropewalks making running rigging and dock lines to equip the numerous commercial and recreational sailing ships and boats. Dry docks and shipyards look out on bikeways and walkways circumscribing the tidal flats, from which hundreds of locals and tourists observe the port activity, safe in the knowledge that food and goods continue to pour into a port that — thanks to good planning 20 years ago — is well adapted to keep pace with a changing climate and evolving post carbon economy. All of this could be, if only we take a can-do proactive approach toward tomorrow.

    Slar Canal Boat

    Reinvigorated Waterways

    The Foundation of a Resilience Strategy

    Contrary to the techno-paradise that some expect, my belief is that our future will likely resemble our past, and that we may fall back on proven, low energy approaches to supporting human life that have been historically proven to work.  “Isn’t that pessimistic?” asked the interviewer. I replied that I don’t think so. It is in my view even more pessimistic to imagine a world continuing on the current path, becoming a place in which there is no place for human labor or creativity, where rather than doing things with our backs and hands and minds, we must instead wait passively for conveniences and solutions to be marketed to us. That, to me, is the most depressing future imaginable. — Erik Andrus Founder the Vermont Sail Freight Project

    Not so long ago, in the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Hudson River bustled with commerce and lay at the heart of a thriving network of marine highways linking the large cities and smallest communities to a web of regularly scheduled transportation routes — waterways stretching from the Atlantic west to the Great Lakes. Boats of all sizes served local cargo and passenger needs: schooners, sloops, barges, and steamboats connected river town inhabitants. Farmers, merchants, and oystermen relied on this vibrant and diverse fleet to deliver goods to market and to bring back supplies. The Hudson River — and the ships and boats sailing her — were vital and integral to those who worked, lived and thrived along our inland waters, putting places like Kingston and Esopus on the map. Historically, thousands of vessels plied these marine highways, sailing up and down the Hudson Valley, delivering fresh local farm produce ranging from apples to applejack, fish and shellfish, and carrying passengers to ports along the way

    View near Anthony’s nose

    The Kingston and Esopus’ Rondout Creek and Hudson River Working Waterfront has long been a key contributor to our region’s financial wellbeing — though it could be so much more. Now, as we enter a carbon constrained future our Riverport is poised for rebirth, to again become a key regional hub for the transport of goods and people. As we move into a world facing increasingly tough political, economic, and environmental challenges, we must ask ourselves: How shall we, living beside the Hudson River, meet the looming threats of climate change, rising sea level, aging infrastructure, changes to global shipping patterns, threats to food security, upheavals in energy production and distribution, and the risks all these disruptions could bring? As in the 19th and 20th centuries, the answer to those questions, and the solutions to our problems lie only as far away as the lapping waters of our home river.

    NOAA Sea Level Rise Rondout Creek

    This proposal, Rondout Riverport 2040; A Comprehensive Waterfront Plan for a Working Waterfront and Transportation of Goods and People, offers a pragmatic look forward to what — with proper preparation, cooperation and investment — could result in a revitalized and highly profitable Rondout Riverport at mid-century. This plan provides a practical salient vision of resilient shorelines and a working waterfront, redesigned to protect our community from sea level rise and storm surges, built to accommodate a wide spectrum of business, cultural and social uses that will benefit our communities and the Hudson Valley Bioregion. This, to put it simply, is a waterfront proposal that “floats all boats,” promising equity and prosperity for our citizens, large and small industries, investors, entrepreneurs, craftspeople, environmentalists, boatmen and women, dreamers and doers.

    But here is a warning: An optimistic future depends on our will to make it so. If we pursue politics and policy as usual, we could face a grim tomorrow as our region is hobbled by climate change: Abandoned, flooded, moldering shoreside buildings and piers; low-lying and failing sewage treatment plants and electric utilities; eco-refugees crowding our upstate communities seeking limited food and shelter; and a polluted, dead estuary as oil and chemical plants are inundated. Despite sincere efforts at incremental change and adaptation planning, without visionary action right now, our region could face a dire tomorrow marked by rising water and plummeting economic fortunes. The choice remains ours.

    The reality of escalating climate change makes clear that we must redesign our economies if we are to maintain quality of life in a carbon constrained future. A major opportunity offers itself: to take advantage of our wealth in waterways and return to our bioregion’s nautical roots and pioneer a new industry grounded in tried and true technology that once drove our economy: low/no carbon shipping and post carbon transportation businesses and organizations.

    In the New York City metro area today, 80% of freight transport is carried by truck, a mode of transportation that is congesting our highways, increasing air pollution, and entirely dependent on fossil fuels. In a carbon constrained future, sustainable water transport (an innovative mix of sailing vessels, hybrid/fossil fuel free electric ships, and people/electric powered transport) will almost certainly be a necessity. As the climate crisis deepens, water-based transportation routes can link communities and promote resilience throughout the Hudson Valley — doing so without congestion, without pollution, while being energy efficient, non-dependent on increasingly expensive fossil fuels, and very profitable. 

    Water-based transportation — once ubiquitous on the Hudson — is just about the only form of transportation, other than the bicycle, that requires little or no roadway maintenance. Navigation channels are less costly than roads to keep up; they do not require a large industrial base, and are far less energy-intensive than alternatives.

    And you needn’t look far for proof: The 363-mile-long Erie Canal system, linking the Atlantic Ocean with the Great Lakes, has been continuously operational since 1825. The cost of keeping it running is tiny compared to that of equivalent highway mileage. The Hudson and its linked waterways comprise the greatest set of transportation assets in the world — assets greatly underutilized today. Those water blue highways will see their status grow in a post carbon world, and communities along them will prosper as a result. Kingson and Esopus are two such communities. The Rondout Riverport is strategically located to be part of this great renaissance: located just ninety miles from one of the greatest ice-free harbors on earth; and sixty miles from the entrance to the Erie Canal. 

    But to make this opportunity a reality, Riverport infrastructure must be created to increase capacity, while being nimble enough to respond to rising sea and river levels and worsening storm surges, as well as shifting economic tides. The port will also need to be made accessible to smaller, more numerous vessels on a protected and restored working waterfront. To thrive as a maritime and commercial center in a carbon constrained era, Rondout Riverport’s infrastructure must include:

    • Charging stations for electric and electric hybrid vessels, flood-proof storage and production facilities for biofuels like methane (produced by sewage treatment plants), biodiesel (from restaurants’ used fryer fat), and hydrogen (created from seawater while sailing vessels are underway);
    • A flood proofed waterfront and flood proofed warehouses and trading houses;[1]
    • Local ship and boat building and repair facilities to support our local commercial fleet;
    • More traditional break bulk cranes for transfer of palletized, and bagged cargo;
    • Across-docking facilities for transfer of goods from ship-to-ship and from ship to first and-last-mile providers (i.e. small sailing, rowing, hybrid vessels as well as people/electric powered commercial trikes and wagons);
    • Access to innovative training facilities to provide a labor force: the new traders, river rovers, seafarers and port workers. This labor force will need training based on models for “preserving the tools and skills of the past to serve the future.”
    Pre-carbon Working Waterfront

    Rondout Riverport will not stand alone, but will be integrated into the greater Hudson Valley Bioregion, along with the wider Northeast and U.S. transportation and distribution system, with which it will engage collectively and creatively to unleash an extraordinary, historic transition to a future beyond fossil fuels; a future that is vibrant, abundant, resilient, and ultimately preferable, more equitable, and more economically viable than the current model.

    Rondout Riverport 2040 will serve as an empowering example to our bioregion and our country — demonstrating the viability of ethical livelihoods and teaching beneficial sustainable technologies that do minimal socio-environmental harm; methodologies that foster self-reliance and promote Slow Tech hands-on work practices.

    The result: entrepreneurs, professionals, technicians, craftspeople, academics and students from across our bioregion, and across the United States, will be drawn to our state-of-the-art waterfront — gathering here to learn from each other. Our waterfront will be like no other in our region, or maybe in the nation: Becoming a living laboratory, cultivating not only practical and sustainable energy, commerce and transportation solutions, but generating a flow of fresh, pathfinding ideas. 

    To bring these advanced infrastructure changes about — working with partners throughout the region — we will need to establish:

    Street of Ships
    • A new binding agreement with the region’s farmers and farm advocacy organizations in our “foodshed” that offers subsidized support of infrastructure including, but not limited to:
      • Full employment in year-round growing season zero carbon greenhouses;
      • First and last mile transportation of agricultural products to processors and the waterfront (using existing and new rail-trails as bike/trike corridors);
      • Solar powered cold storage at critical locations;
      • Year-round indoor farm markets.
    • An inter-port agreement with small and mid-sized ports along the Hudson River, the Erie, and Champlain Canals, and New York Harbor:
      • This agreement would include the sharing of information on resilience and “future proofing” of all waterfronts;
      • Establish a Sustainable Working Waterfront Toolkit — making available the historical and current uses and economics of New York’s waterfronts as a resource. The toolkit must include legal, policy, and financing tools that river ports and waterfront communities can tap into to preserve and enhance local and regional port facilities.
    • Small ship access to flood proofed regional produce and fish markets:
      • The Hunts Point Market and Fish Market must be made accessible to small ships, delivering farm goods from upstate and returning with seafood from the Market;
    • A new agreement with transport unions that allows ships to load and unload with their own equipment. Local industry will need to work in close conjunction with the unions to hire and train more people for post carbon longshore work;
    • A partnership with the region’s Maritime Academies, the Hudson River Maritime Museum’s Wooden Boat School, and the Harbor School to train mariners, and to teach the logistics careers required to serve the new post carbon working waterfront; with the ultimate goal being the creation of an education center in the mid-Hudson Valley where professional practitioners and apprentices can participate in practical workshops to relearn maritime and other heritage skills and old-new technology to serve present and future needs; 
    • An endowment for the preservation and utilization of traditional maritime skills and tools, the establishment of a traditional knowledge database/Wiki; library; and pre/post carbon tool, technology and machinery collection. This innovative interactive educational resource serves to preserve, restore, and promote the re-use of traditional skills, integrating those skills and methods with modern know-how and appropriate post carbon technologies;
    • Create maritime mixed-use zones where public parks, walkways and bikeways are built in flood zones and are adjacent to and part of the working waterfront — acting as a source of recreation and as a vital part of flood control;
    • Establish a strong working relationship with NOAA’s National Sea Grant Program for working waterfronts;
    • Advocate for a reduced, less intrusive regulatory role for the US Army Corps of Engineers. Instead, encourage Corps funding be channeled into partnerships with other agencies, local non-profit organizations, and an engaged public in order to develop, and redevelop climate change-resistant and resilient Hudson River Ports, and to create living shorelines, restored wetlands, and estuarine habitats.

    Through this diversity and synergy of uses, Rondout Riverport’s working waterfront will also:

    • Create jobs in sailing, logistics, shipbuilding, harbor maintenance, craft, food production and more;
    • Revitalize the waterfront community via economic development combined with better public access and recreation;
    • Improve regional food production and distribution, linking producers to markets in the Hudson Valley and beyond.
    • Design and build a maritime commerce micro-hub for, aggregation, warehousing, co- packing, and marketing. 

    Rondout Riverport will be the homeport for future-proof sailing, alternative fuel, and solar electric ships. It will provide training in maritime skills, shipbuilding, and longshore trades, while also educating crews in “earth care, people care, and fair share” principles. These future-proof ships and their locally trained crews will carry people, goods, and knowledge to and from towns along the Hudson and on the canals. 

    As Rondout Riverport becomes the working waterfront of tomorrow, the constraints and advantages of smaller and (s)lower tech modes of transport must be considered in every aspect of the port’s design.  Historic and modern technologies must meld seamlessly to offer approaches that are more self-sufficient and sustainable. Just one example: ships of all sorts, meeting a variety of needs, will have to be built (and rebuilt) locally, from locally sourced or recycled materials, and be crewed by locally trained seafarers, in order to adjust to declines in these resources globally, declines brought on by a combined climate and economic crisis and social upheaval abroad. These new vessels will likely be different than the ones we build today; smaller, more versatile, adaptable, energy-smart, and affordable.

    As fossil fuels become more expensive or less available, replaced by alternative sources, and are restricted by climate change policy — port infrastructure will need to be part of a carbon neutral trading network for “short sea shipping” that links us to the region and the world, serving the Hudson Valley, the New York/New Jersey Harbor, Coastal waterways, and transfer points for goods from overseas. 

    Moreover, the Roundout Riverport will be well positioned to become a laboratory for maritime innovation, as public agencies and private companies accelerate their investigations of the potential economic and environmental benefits of transferring more cargo from roadways to blueways.

    Imagine the Future, Realize the Vision

    Life at the water’s edge is rapidly changing. The impacts of new technology, patterns of urban development, and globalization are redefining global logistics, and while some waterfront cities will thrive as ports and grow under these new conditions, others will need to evolve in order to survive and succeed…. 

    The Rondout Creek today, lapping at the shores of Kingston, and of the Sleightsburg and Connelly hamlets in the town of Esopus, is in the flux of significant change. The waterfront as it is, represents an amalgam of positives and negatives. At its best, it boasts commercial shipyards, marinas, marine services businesses; institutions including the Hudson River Maritime Museum (and its Wooden Boat School and Shipyard); along with wetlands, open space, promenades, magnificent scenery and recreational possibilities. But at its worst, it is marred by brownfields, combined sewer overflows, and a variety of non-waterfront dependent uses that make poor use of water accessibility, marine transportation and port possibilities.

    Most unfortunate of all: existing development plans lack a sweeping vision and often fail to take a future into account dominated by climate impacts, including severe storm surges, along with a steady sea and river level rise that will soon inundate portions of the currently existing Roundout and Hudson shoreline. Plans that fail to take climate change into account will drown in insolvency.

    Over the past few years, a variety of plans and proposals have been put forward, each with very good elements, but also with gaps and flaws:

    However, importantly, very few if any of these proposals are in the implementation phase. And little of the available climate and sea level change studies and data are included in the port plans as presently formulated.

    Rondout Riverport 2040 is unique in that it takes likely forecasts of the near future fully into account; it is a proposal that offers a hard, sober look at the realities of our climate change, alternative energy, and global supply chain future.   

    But for this plan to be realized, stakeholders, partners, and existing maritime institutions will need to buy-in now and participate actively in the planning and implementation process. Those institutions include, but are not limited to the Center for Post Carbon Logistics, the Schooner Apollonia, the Hudson River Maritime Museum’s solar electric passenger vessel Solaris, the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, Sustainable Hudson Valley’s Regional Hudson Valley Climate Action Plan,  The Riverport Coalition, and the Beacon Sloop Club’s Woody Guthrie. This diverse partnership must also be inclusive of public and private landowners, as well as land conservation organizations, including but not limited to the Kingston Land Trust, Scenic Hudson, and the hundreds of Hudson Valley organizations and individuals working for a more resilient and sustainable future.

    Threat Assessment:

    A first step: the Rondout communities must start by objectively assessing near future threats and evaluating our greatest points of weakness — assessing local infrastructure, and economic, political, social, and environmental structures. Rondout Riverport communities will especially need to fortify against the economic and environmental storms to come by doing work to enrich our towns and neighborhoods today, reducing risk and enhancing resilience for the future, by:

    Threat Assessment
    • Implementing community flood-proofing and simultaneously introducing drought-resistant landscaping, in preparation for extreme weather patterns;
    • institutionalizing green building practices;
    • zoning against development in climate disaster-prone floodplains;
    • installing redundant communication and storm-proof energy systems;
    • establishing systems for community-wide food security
    • creating “resiliency hubs”, equipped to deal with sudden health, environmental, or weather / climate disasters, and develop strategies for proactive risk minimization and management;
    • using the tools of community “placemaking” to include the broadest possible participation in planning for, and developing, a working and recreational Rondout Waterfront and Port that will be operational and adaptable for the first half of the 21st century and beyond.
    • develop an education and training center for rapid proliferation of all these practices and trades in and beyond the Rondout Riverport

    Placemaking — a pathway to the future:

    Rondout Riverport 2040 will engender the Hudson Valley’s can-do spirit, harness our region’s inventiveness and our love of innovation, allowing our region and its people to not merely survive in the Post Carbon era, but thrive. And why not? After all, our region gave the world the steamboat, the telegraph, the submarine, FM radio, the first interactive software systems vital to today’s computers, and even potato chips. We seem born to invent the future!

    Roundout Riverport 2040, by cooperating fully with all partners, will incorporate the best elements of existing planning documents; undertake a thorough land use, flood plain, and sea level rise analysis; examine current trends in shipping, energy, food security and port management; assess the best climate change and economic forecasts; and create an adaptive re-use Waterfront plan that incorporates the best of 19th, 20th, and 21st century technologies. 

    But this process will do far more than construct a vision. It must ensure that this vision is aligned with community values and sensibilities. To achieve this goal, we will use a placemaking approach as the structure for addressing critical questions about how best to mobilize the many assets of the Rondout Riverport in a coordinated fashion to meet community needs and attract diverse resources.  

    Placemaking is a holistic approach for considering the possibilities inherent in a locality by identifying a unifying purpose or theme — the essence of the place — and then identifying multiple strategies, at multiple scales, that relate to this theme, providing direction for achieving unified objectives and goals.

    The foundation of placemaking is a focus on the many natural benefits of public space – in order to achieve the most comprehensive multiple uses, aesthetic benefits, connectivity, and social interaction. This process will generate key insights into how state, municipal, and county government agencies can best coordinate implementation efforts and find the resources to address problems and opportunities.

    The placemaking approach will catalyze the integration of the many layers of conceptual planning already underway by various entities, aiding in the development of collaborative strategies for redeveloping the Port so that it serves multiple river uses and users.

    The partners will work with, and gain consensus from, other Hudson Valley organizations to begin realizing the Rondout Riverport 2040 vision. A network of groups, including the Boatbuilders, Sustainable Hudson Valley Senior Fellows, Good Work Institute Fellows Network, C4PCL’s advisory board, plus staff and contractors, will provide intensive inputs and garner resources to translate the partners’ vision into robust planning during the rest of 2020 and 2021.

    It is now past time to implement the many excellent ideas generated by our communities and their planners. It is time to bring the planning process forward into those communities. The path to a bright, sustainable future starts with research and engagement, and placemaking in Kingston and Espopus and on the Roundout Waterfront.

    Regenerative Port

    The source of our inspiration and empowerment will be our region’s shorefront and its waters, its hands, and minds. Here the best and brightest, urban and rural, “Slow” technologists, craftspeople, educators, planners, artists, schoolchildren, and seniors, can come together to remake our post-modern world. Here we’ll find new, efficient, green ways to produce energy; revolutionize agriculture to assure food security; reinvent transportation on land and water to move goods up and down our Hudson and to prosper in the challenging times ahead. Here we’ll help birth a new, inclusive regional economy that rewards all citizens, while celebrating democracy, cooperation, and public service.

    Picture a Roundout Port in which every day, diverse participants — Transition and Permaculture practitioners, boat and ship builders, coopers, riggers, longshore workers, managers, carpenters, commercial fishermen, millwrights, engineers, potters, community development financial institutions, weavers, woodworkers, planners, architects, writers, historians, archivists, computer and IT experts, and people from wildly diverse vocations — will all merge and meld their talents to realize the vision of Rondout Riverport 2040.

    In implementing the Rondout Riverport vision, we’ll move via hands-on experiences beyond spin and abstract buzzwords ­– past “environmental”, or “sustainable”, or “eco” this or that. Here, our work will focus on a single place and on a Just Transition away from fossil fuels. The times ahead will give new meaning to the word deckhand, as all join together to create the naturally viable means for living and being in community in the 21st Century — as we prosper economically, emotionally, and spiritually, beyond the realm of coal and oil. 

    The next step will be one of the most critical: to gather all our research and data, analyze it, and commit to honestly confronting challenges, while also boldly embracing opportunities and possibilities. We must move forward quickly and vigorously — climate change and economic change are moving ahead swiftly. We must inspire individuals, communities, local leaders, and City, County, and State officials to commit to the creation of a thriving, innovative Rondout Riverport and Working Waterfront, as a gateway to a vast system of sustainable blue waterways that together will enable a Post Carbon Future full of hope and opportunity.


    [1] A trading house an exporter, importer and also a trader that purchases and sells products for other businesses. Trading houses provide a service for businesses that want international trade experts to receive or deliver goods or services.

  • Comments by the Center for Post Carbon Logistics on the NYC Comprehensive Waterfront Plan: Working Waterfront and Transportation of Goods.

    The New York Port in 2050

    “Moving goods and people from place to place in a carbon constrained future will be dependent on sailing vessels, hybrid/fossil free electric ships, and people/electric, powered transport for first and last mile logistics. “

    New York’s Working Waterfront has long been a key contributor to the region’s financial wellbeing and our nation’s economy. But, in a carbon constrained future, how will goods and people be moved from place to place, and what role will The City’s Waterfront play in this vision? How should we meet the looming challenges of climate change, rising sea level, aging infrastructure, changes to global shipping patterns, threats to food security, and the risks these changes bring to New York’s financial sector?

    The biggest question of all: How do we address this daunting multitude of challenges and turn them into opportunities for transforming the waterfront and Port in order to effectively and efficiently serve our regional and national economy far into the future?

    “Life at the water’s edge is rapidly changing. The impacts of new technology, patterns of urban development, and globalization are redefining global logistics, and while some waterfront cities will thrive as ports and grow under these new conditions, others will need to evolve in order to survive and succeed…. How will New York re-invent its waterfront?”

    If present trends continue, New York Harbor will need to be transformed into a hub of the spokes for “short sea shipping” (any movement of freight by water that doesn’t cross oceans such as freight ferries, short-haul barges and various other marine vessels). rather than serving as an unsustainable container cargo port. The good news: the New York metro region has an extensive network of waterways, and so is very well suited for the short sea shipping mode of freight transport. Moreover, public agencies and private companies are investigating the potential economic and environmental benefits of transferring more cargo from road to sea.

    As New York moves forward to the working waterfront of tomorrow, the constraints, and in some cases the advantages, of smaller and (s)lower tech modes of transport must be considered; allowing for the integration of slow tech transport into harbor infrastructure to support these imminent changes.

    If the New York port is to thrive, 19th, 20th, and 21st Century technology must meld seamlessly into new, mid-century methods of transport, also with an emphasis on what might seem like bygone, but productive, methodologies in order to become more self-sufficient and sustainable.

    To offer just one example, ships of all sorts will need to be built (and rebuilt) locally, from locally sourced or recycled materials, and be crewed by locally trained seafarers, in order to adjust to declines in these resources globally, declines brought on by the climate crisis and social upheaval abroad.  These new vessels will likely be very different than the ones built today

    As fossil fuels become more expensive and are restricted by climate change policy, port infrastructure will need to be part of a carbon neutral trading network that links us to the region and the world. The good news: our port is well positioned to become a laboratory for maritime innovation, offering competitive freight rates on 18th and 19th Century shipping routes enhanced by 21st Century technology.

    A Port Facing the Greatest Challenges in Its History

    Our world is now convulsed by converging crises of a magnitude never seen by humanity: climate change and sea level rise, global economic instability, and peak everything. Add to these threats the risk of wars over natural resources, climate migration, failure of aging and over stressed infrastructure, unstable economies, and the erosion of community values. Each of these crises presents particularly thorny problems for New York City, its Port, and the region. Challenges which also offer opportunities.

    New York City owes its very existence to its location on one of the greatest ice-free harbors on earth; in turn, that great urban powerhouse was built on its Harbor and shipping industry. But as new threats loom, our aging Port has devolved into a dangerously tenuous lifeline to the world overseas.

    Mid-west drought

    Today, the far-flung international trade network that once pumped vibrant economic life into New York City and our region is threatened with collapse as imported natural resources grow more expensive, carbon pollution from shipping grows much worse, and the fossil fuels needed to transport goods become increasingly scarce and costly. Spiralling petroleum costs, and turmoil in nations upon which we rely for imported goods could snap our international lifeline at any time. 

    The present system is unsustainable, so we must prepare to transform it, and we must move quickly

    It’s important to understand that all of the many crises we face are intimately linked to each other, and magnify each other, impacting our port’s future. Just a few troubling examples:

    • A severe long-term drought in the American Midwest, could cut off our region’s supply of wheat, corn and soy, causing food shortages and a financial calamity.
    • Peak oil requires that we drill for fossil fuels in increasingly extreme landscapes, like the deep-water Gulf of Mexico, prone to more and more powerful hurricanes, or by using hydraulic fracturing that will likely contaminate groundwater in the heart of our regional foodshed, and the grain belt. Sudden price surges would impact shipping and our Port.
    • Our sprawling global oil pipeline stretches around the globe, making us vulnerable and dependent on volatile states prone to war, revolution, and migratory upheaval. Again, such conflicts could seriously impact global commerce and our Port.
    • An economic crash or a financially-sapping resource war abroad, could wreck our balance of trade and shatter our tax base, then making it fiscally impossible to adapt our infrastructure to accommodate climate change impacts, which would lead to more unpreparedness and economic hardship.
    • Meanwhile, poor harbor planning, and inappropriate non-water-dependent development along New York City’s flood prone waterfront could seriously hamper adaptation to these many crises. 

    The accumulation and interaction of such shocks could be catastrophic if we do not prepare

    Despite its present dominance, the New York Port and its current maritime logistics system remains fragile. It is reliant upon carbon-based fuels, driving internal combustion engines. This local fossil fuel-dependent system is interwoven into long-distance, globalized trade and is designed for Just-In-Time delivery. Importantly, it also depends upon a financial accounting system that avoids paying for negative environmental and social externalities such as global warming, environmental pollution, and sea level rise. But the bill for these negative externalities is coming due now and will be paid by our Port, our city, and our regional economy for decades to come if we don’t prepare to prevent that from happening.

    Here is a stark reality that we must deal with if we are to thrive as a 21st Century Port: The World Economic Forum determined in 2018 that if shipping were a country, it would be the world’s sixth-biggest greenhouse gas emitter. Those maritime emissions must be slashed, and soon. That being true, there are grave doubts that our current shipping system can easily adapt to the policy and technological shifts needed to successfully curb climate change. But failure to adapt will be catastrophic for our Port: sea level rise alone could make sure of that. So we have no choice: we must adapt.

    The NY/NJ Port, New York City’s working waterfront, and the greater region are at a crossroads, a turning point. Looking forward rationally at all the indicators, our “business as usual” carbon model, dependent on globe-trotting fossil fuel powered container ships is putting us on course for systemic failure, marked by cataclysmic energy shortages and infrastructure collapse, inundation from sea level rise, financial meltdown and its attendant social disarray.

    For those who think otherwise, our climate change future and its inevitable impacts were foreshadowed when Hurricane Sandy made landfall in New York City in October 2010, bringing with it a destructive wall of water that flooded subway tunnels and neighborhoods, cut off power to lower Manhattan, washed away century-old structures, cost the city millions, and left it forever changed. Sandy “was a turning point, that’s true not just for anticipating future Sandy-like storms, but also for predicting overall sea-level rise and such climate-change impacts as more frequent heat waves, which the New York City Panel on Climate Change projects will triple by the 2050s.”

    Despite widespread agreement upon these future climate change-driven inevitabilities, the Port Authority — because it has invested so heavily in large container port infrastructure — continues to write “resiliency” reports, even as large container ships becomes increasingly obsolete — outdated dinosaurs  at the end of a fossil fuel era.

    It is also expected that Port Authority will continue to pour millions of dollars into incremental “port improvements,” while failing to address the inexorable rise of the sea and the eventual destruction of most of its expensive industrial port infrastructure. Likewise, the Corps of Engineers, despite some attempts at “greenwashing” remains in denial, as are the City of New York, and the States of New York and New Jersey. Bold initiatives proposed after Hurricane Sandy collect dust on agency bookshelves.  Attempts at “pilot” projects related to climate change protection and adaptation have so far been way too feeble, too small and too late.

    Meeting Challenges of a 21st Century Port

    If the Port (and the City and Region it serves) survives into the second half of this century it will be significantly smaller, more sustainable, and resilient with an emphasis on adaptation, and realistic outcomes for the continuation of the transport of goods and people.

    The contemporary Port of NY/NJ is the largest port on the East Coast and the third largest in the US. For the freight offloaded at its facilities, our Port is just one stop in an extensive intermodal distribution chain.

    But here’s another important fact: we drastically underutilize an invaluable regional transportation resource: our local waterways. In New York City’s metro region, 80% of freight transport today is carried by truck, a practice that congests our highways, increases air pollution, and is entirely dependent on fossil fuels. In the context of a working waterfront of the second third of the 21st century, (electric) trucks and rail may continue to have relevance in city-to-city transport, but all large trucks will likely have necessarily disappeared from the urban core.  Congestion, pollution, and quality of life issues make this inevitable. And Just in Time delivery will be replaced by Warehouse in Transit Logistics (WIT or Warehouse –in- transit” is the successor to JIT or just-in-time which is now selectively outdated. Many cargoes that speed along highways to spend days in a warehouse could as easily and more economically / beneficially move by water).

    In the 18th, and 19th and early 20th centuries, the Hudson River, the New York Harbor, and the NY/NJ Harbor Estuary and its river tributaries served as a bustling network of marine highways linking even the smallest communities to a web of regularly scheduled commercial routes. Boats of all sizes met local cargo and passenger needs: schooners, sloops, barges, and steamboats connected river town inhabitants. Farmers, merchants, and oystermen relied on this vibrant and diverse fleet of vessels to bring in supplies and deliver goods to market. The NY/NJ Harbor Estuary and its tributaries — and the ships and boats sailing them — were vital and integral to those who worked and lived along our inland waters.

    Historically, thousands of vessels plied these marine highways, sailing to and from The City’s Harbor to the farming communities of New Jersey and the Hudson Valley, delivering fresh local farm produce, fish, shellfish, and passengers to ports along the way.

    Today, those marine  highways still exist, but thanks to the boom in highway construction in the mid-20th Century, have fallen into deep neglect. They now need to be reinvigorated. Injecting new life into these regional maritime trade routes is far more than just a celebration of tradition. In a carbon constrained future, sustainable water transport will be a necessity.  As the climate crisis deepens, water-based low-or-no carbon transportation routes could link communities throughout the region.

    The rivers, bays, canals, and coasts of the Hudson Valley, NY Harbor, and Mid-Atlantic region continue to be a marine highway today, but one that is limited to deeply dredged channels leading to container ports and fossil fuel and chemical tank farms.

    In a carbon constrained future, we will need to return to our region’s nautical roots and advocate for the maritime, and for the “first and last mile technology” necessary for moving goods and people from place to place minimizing carbon pollution, opting for existing and emerging low carbon shipping and post carbon transportation businesses and organizations.

    Question: How can we rapidly develop a new approach to waterway transportation logistics that is attentive to, and resilient to the climate emergency? And under fast-evolving environmental and social conditions, how can we alter our Port to sustain a vibrant economy and standard of living for ourselves and future generations — one that is also equitable and inclusive?

    Vision for a Working Waterfront and NY Port in the Second Third of the 21st Century

    Oddly enough, a vision for an efficient, economically vibrant, post carbon working waterfront in the 2030s, ‘40s and ‘50s will likely resemble the New York Harbor of the late 19th century, rather than what we see today. The Harbor of the near future will need to link not only to roadways and railways, but to our region’s marine highways, which will carry massive amounts of cargo and people.

    Shoreline infrastructure will have to scale down and increase in capacity, and be nimble in its response to rising sea levels and more violent storms. It will have to be accessible to smaller, more numerous vessels on a preserved and restored Working Waterfront that is socially and culturally integral to the communities and our ‘sense of place” and include:

    • Charging stations for electric and electric hybrid vessels, flood-proof storage and production facilities for biofuels like methane (from sewage treatment plants), biodiesel (from used fryer fat), and hydrogen (created from seawater while sailing vessels are underway).
    • Waterfront and flood proofed warehouses and trading houses, business that specializes in facilitating  transactions between a home country and foreign countries. (A trading house is an exporter, importer and also a trader that purchases and sells products for other businesses. Trading houses provide a service for businesses that want international trade experts to receive or deliver goods or services).
    • Local ship and boat building and repair facilities to support a local fleet,
    • More accessible customs clearance areas,
    • More traditional break bulk cranes for bulk, palletized, and bagged cargo,
    • Cross-docking facilities for transfer of goods from larger ocean-going ships to smaller short sea shipping vessels, and for transfer to first and last mile providers, i.e. small sailing, rowing, hybrid vessels as well as people/electric powered small commercial trikes and wagons.
    • Access for docking of “historic” ships to enable the “new” traders and seafarer models for “preserving the tools and skills of the past to serve the future.”

    To bring these infrastructure changes about, we will need to immediately establish:

    • A new binding agreement with the region’s farmers and farm advocacy organizations in our “foodshed,”(that includes a food security plan for the New York City Bioregion). This agreement could be modeled on New York City’s agreement with farmers in the drinking water Watershed.
    • An inter-port agreements with small and mid-sized ports within a 100 mile radius of the Harbor.
    • Small ship access to flood proofed regional produce and fish markets.
    • A new agreement with transport unions to allow ships to load and unload with their own equipment. Working with the Unions to hire and train more people for post carbon longshore work.
    • A partnership with the region’s Maritime Academies and the Harbor School to retrain mariners and for logistics careers for the new post carbon working waterfront; creating a maritime education center where professional practitioners and apprentices can participate in practical workshops to relearn maritime and Port skills of the past to serve the future.
    • An endowment for a new “sailor’s snug harbor for the “aged, decrepit and worn-out sailors”
    • An endowment for the preservation and utilization of traditional maritime skills and tools, and a traditional knowledge database, library, and pre/post carbon tool, technology, and machinery collection. This activity serves to preserve, restore and promote the re-use of traditional skills.
    • Establish a Sustainable Working Waterfront Toolkit—enumerating the historical and current uses and economics of New York’s waterfront. The toolkit must include legal, policy, and financing tools which river ports, blue highways and estuarine communities can use to preserve and enhance local and regional port facilities.
    • Create maritime mixed-use zones where public parks, walkways and bikeways are built in flood zones and are adjacent to and part of a working waterfront.
    • Establish a strong working relationship with NOAA’s National Sea Grant Program for working waterfronts.
    • Advocate for a reduced, less intrusive regulatory role for the US Army Corps of Engineers. Instead, encourage funding to the Corps for partnerships with other agencies, non-profit organizations, and an engaged public for developing, and redeveloping, a sustainable NY Port in a carbon constrained future, including but not limited to working with NY/NJ Baykeeper, the billion oyster project, and the Hudson River Foundation to build oyster reefs for habitat improvement and shoreline protection.

    The New Working Waterfront will also:

    • Create jobs in seafaring, logistics, ship building, harbor maintenance and more.
    • Revitalize waterfront communities by preserving the working waterfront and commercial enterprises, while providing more public access and recreation.
    • Improve regional food production and distribution, linking producers to buyers.

    Imagining our Working Waterfront, circa 2050

    Put simply, the shift from road, rail, and fossil fuel dependence, to dependence on our region’s extensive network of marine highways in a low-or-no carbon era, is a “breeze.”

    Water-based transportation is just about the only form of transportation other than the bicycle that requires little or no roadway maintenance. There are no surfaces to grade or pave, no tracks, no bridges or trestles to care for. Of course, canals need to be restored and preserved; navigation channels need to be marked with buoys; locks and lighthouses need to be manned and maintained. But unlike motorway or railroad maintenance, these activities don’t require a large industrial base, and are far less energy-intensive than alternatives.

    The 363-mile-long Erie Canal system, linking the Atlantic Ocean with the Great Lakes, for example, has been continuously operational and profitable since 1825. The cost of keeping it running is tiny compared to the cost of equivalent highway mileage and with winters expected to be more mild the canal may be open year round.

    The Hudson, Long Island Sound, the Bays of New York Harbor, and a significant number of natural and artificial waterways in the US and Canada comprise the greatest set of transportation assets in the world. Those marine highways will only see their status grow in a post carbon world — and the NY/NJ Harbor area is especially blessed with such waterways.

    Let’s imagine: It is a hot, humid, late autumn day in 2050. From a high floor in one of lower Manhattan’s surviving skyscrapers, a trading house ship spotter, sees the topmasts of a tall ship entering the Lower Bay. The watcher signals the pilot schooner on post off of what was once Sandy Hook, and waiting Tug Augustin Mouchot a solar powered tug are dispatched to tow the engineless sea-going square rigger to a berth in the new port in the recently completed Gowanus Bay and Erie Basin Harbor with its oyster encrusted seawall created by repurposing concrete and stone from  waterfront buildings and piers inundated by rising seas over the last 30 years. 

    Clipper Ship

    The ship, the Jorne Langelaan, named after the builder of the first of the post carbon Eco-Clippers, has its crew aloft putting a harbor furl on the hemp cloth sails. She carries a mixed cargo of Caribbean fair trade coffee and cocoa beans bound for the region’s roasters and chocolatiers as well as preserved tropical fruits and rum. The Langelaan is looking a little “worse for wear” having skirted the 5th named Atlantic storm of the season. But her New York trained crew of young men and women is in good spirits, looking forward to spending time ashore, and to a few drinks of brew, cider, and spirits locally made and delivered by sloop and schooner from around the region, and to a good meal at a cafe serving up dishes harvested from the Harbor’s new artisan fishery and from oyster beds in shallows created by submerged piers and streets.   

    A long shore crew, warehouse workers, drovers and their electric assist people-powered tricycles and wagons converge at the waterfront’s new storm-proofed floating dock — which rises and falls with surging tides. Cargo surveyors assist with the loading of schooners. Crews on solar electric canal barges and sloops make ready to transfer cargo from the Langelaan to their holds, and to carry that cargo to ports up and down the Hudson River, to the newly opened Delaware and Raritan, and Delaware and Hudson Canals, coastal New Jersey, Long Island, and New England. 

    The Pilot Schooner comes alongside the Langelaan and the pilot goes up the ladder to the helm to direct the square rigger to its destination. Customs agents sail from Staten Island to clear the cargo. 

    A huge tarred manila hemp hawser is passed to the ship from the tug and the last few miles to port pass under the clipper’s hull. The docking pilot skillfully moves the ship to the dock while the Clipper’s crew readies the ship’s gear, opening hatches, and starting up a steam winch that will do most of the lifting. There are also floating cargo cranes that can be used for cargo heavier or bulkier than can be handled by the ship’s gear. 

    This (s)low tech port makes the best use of tried and true 19th century technology, supported with 21st century solar and battery electric gear and vehicles. More people are at work on the waterfront than any time since the 1920s; there are more warehouses and trading houses, ship building, repair facilities, and docking facilities than at any time in New York’s nautical history.

    Just behind the waterfront are sail and rope makers utilizing New York hemp; forges and foundries using concentrated solar heat to form steel and bronze fittings. Riggers are hard at work in rope walks making running rigging and dock lines for the numerous sailing ships. Dry docks and shipyards look out on bikeways and walkways circumscribing the tidal flats from which hundreds of locals and tourists watch the port activity — safe in the knowledge that food and goods continue to come into the city, not “just in time,” but perhaps just enough. 

    This narrative offers a positive look forward at the New York Port at mid-century. But that optimistic future totally depends on the will to make it so. Should we pursue politics and policy as usual, we may face a grimmer New York waterfront in 2050: Abandoned, flooded, mouldering buildings and piers; failing, low-lying sewage treatment plants and electric utilities; climate change and rising sea-driven New York City migrants crowding upstate communities seeking food and shelter; a polluted, fish empty estuary as oil and chemical plants go underwater. Food and fuel become too expensive except for the very wealthy; Crime and violence escalating, as are protests and riots bordering on insurrection, hard for law enforcement to contain; The City becomes more and more ungovernable, and faces a dark future bounded by economic gloom and rising water. 

    The choice is ours. The path to a bright, sustainable future starts with this process of city-wide community engagement, and a research gathering effort that seeks input on a Working Waterfront. A good first step is being taken to better inform the waterfront planning process.

    NY Port 2040

    The next step will be even more critical: to take all of the information gathered, and to commit to honestly confronting challenges, while also boldly embracing opportunities and possibilities. We must move forward quickly and vigorously, and we need to do more than just convene. We must inspire individuals, communities, local leaders, city and state governments to commit to creating a thriving, post carbon Working Waterfront. We must also commit to the creation of a network of sustainable blue waterways in a region that advocates for a post carbon transition that people will embrace as a collective adventure, as a common journey, as something positive, and above all, as a future full of Hope. 


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