The Prince George Air Improvement Roundtable (PGAIR) held the first in a series of public sessions discussing the impact of the transportation sector on air quality on Tuesday.
The event, which only drew two members of the public, featured presentations by UNBC air quality researcher Peter Jackson, B.C. Trucking Association president Louise Yako, Prince George Airport spokesperson Lindsay Cotter and Carbon Offset Aggregation
Cooperative CEO George
Stedeford.
PGAIR executive director Terry Robert said he was disappointed by the poor turnout at the event, but doesn't consider it an indicator of lack of interest in air quality issues in the city.
"We know people are busy. Not everybody can come out and spend a Tuesday night listening to presentations," Robert said.
"We've created an online air quality comment and inquiry form on our website. [And] we're trying to get out into the community."
A second public session is slated for March 27 at the Civic Centre and will feature presentations from CN Rail, the City of Prince George, B.C. Scrap-It Program and local air quality analyst Dennis Fudge.
"Hopefully by the end of these dialogues we can have a pretty good conversation about what the emissions look like from the transportation sector," Robert said.
"The goal here is to help us make good recommendations on how to reduce emissions."
Transportation emissions are a significant portion of the total fine particulate emissions in the local airshed, Jackson said.
Jackson and his research partner Bruce Ainslie are fine-tuning a computer model of the city's airshed. While not perfect, Jackson said, the model does show gasoline and diesel emissions are a
significant contributor of ultra-fine particulate, called PM 2.5.
For coarser particles, called PM 10, "almost half is from road dust," Jackson said.
If emissions from road traffic and road dust could be removed entirely, the city would experience less than half as many days with concentrations of PM 2.5 above provincial air quality guidelines.
B.C.'s trucking industry is moving toward reducing fine particulate, nitrous oxide and other air pollution emissions, as a result of improvements in engine
standards, Yako said.
"A lot of it has been driven by the U.S. government. We generally adopt what the U.S. is doing after the fact, because we're not a large enough market to lead this kind of thing," Yako said. "In 2010 particulate filters were added to the engine standards."
As older vehicles are replaced with new trucks, particulate emissions from truck traffic will drop, she said.
Other, optional, fuel-saving equipment and practices are being adopted by the members of the association in order to cut costs, Yako said. Fuel costs can represent 25 per cent to 50 per cent of a trucking company's operational costs.
"Driver behaviour has a very big impact. We offer driver training programs," Yako said.
Such programs are at the core of the greenhouse reduction strategies encouraged by the Carbon Offset Aggregation Cooperative, Stedeford said.
The cooperative helps heavy equipment operators track a baseline of greenhouse gas emissions, then reduce those emissions and sell the difference as carbon offsets, he explained.
While some equipment like speed limiters, cab heaters and engine heaters are part of the program, Stedeford said, the focus is on operator training - a factor which can make up to a 25 per cent difference in emissions and fuel consumption.
"We try to get people to understand the behaviours that cause a vehicle to use more fuel," he said.
While airport operations represent a small portion of the city's overall emission picture, according to Jackson, the Prince George Airport has adopted policies to reduce its impact on the airshed.
"We started with the anti-idling campaign in 2009," Cotter said. "The majority of our heavy equipment is less than 10 years old. [And] we avoid fire training on poor air quality days."
A 2007 inventory of the airport's greenhouse gas emissions showed aircraft contributed 64 per cent of the airport's total emissions, with ground vehicles comprising 19 per cent and building operations totaling 16 per cent. For more information about upcoming PGAIR transportation dialog sessions, go online to
pgairquality.com.
