[House Hearing, 110 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
GREEN TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE:
CHALLENGES TO ACCESS AND
IMPLEMENTATION
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MAY 10, 2007
__________
Serial No. 110-27
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Science and Technology
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/science
-------
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
34-909 PDF WASHINGTON DC: 2007
---------------------------------------------------------------------
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing
Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866)512-1800
DC area (202)512-1800 Fax: (202) 512-2250 Mail Stop SSOP,
Washington, DC 20402-0001
______
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
HON. BART GORDON, Tennessee, Chairman
JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois RALPH M. HALL, Texas
EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER JR.,
LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California Wisconsin
MARK UDALL, Colorado LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas
DAVID WU, Oregon DANA ROHRABACHER, California
BRIAN BAIRD, Washington KEN CALVERT, California
BRAD MILLER, North Carolina ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland
DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan
NICK LAMPSON, Texas FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma
GABRIELLE GIFFORDS, Arizona JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois
JERRY MCNERNEY, California W. TODD AKIN, Missouri
PAUL KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania JO BONNER, Alabama
DARLENE HOOLEY, Oregon TOM FEENEY, Florida
STEVEN R. ROTHMAN, New Jersey RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas
MICHAEL M. HONDA, California BOB INGLIS, South Carolina
JIM MATHESON, Utah DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington
MIKE ROSS, Arkansas MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas
BEN CHANDLER, Kentucky MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri PHIL GINGREY, Georgia
CHARLIE MELANCON, Louisiana BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California
BARON P. HILL, Indiana ADRIAN SMITH, Nebraska
HARRY E. MITCHELL, Arizona
CHARLES A. WILSON, Ohio
------
Subcommittee on Technology and Innovation
HON. DAVID WU, Oregon, Chairman
JIM MATHESON, Utah PHIL GINGREY, Georgia
HARRY E. MITCHELL, Arizona VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan
CHARLIE A. WILSON, Ohio JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois
BEN CHANDLER, Kentucky JO BONNER, Alabama
MIKE ROSS, Arizona ADRIAN SMITH, Nebraska
MICHAEL M. HONDA, California
BART GORDON, Tennessee RALPH M. HALL, Texas
MIKE QUEAR Subcommittee Staff Director
RACHEL JAGODA BRUNETTE Democratic Professional Staff Member
COLIN MCCORMICK Democratic Professional Staff Member
TIND SHEPPER RYEN Republican Professional Staff Member
PIPER LARGENT Republican Professional Staff Member
MEGHAN HOUSEWRIGHT Research Assistant
C O N T E N T S
May 10, 2007
Page
Witness List..................................................... 2
Hearing Charter.................................................. 3
Opening Statements
Statement by Representative David Wu, Chairman, Subcommittee on
Technology and Innovation, Committee on Science and Technology,
U.S. House of Representatives.................................. 8
Written Statement............................................ 8
Statement by Representative Phil Gingrey, Ranking Minority
Member, Subcommittee on Technology and Innovation, Committee on
Science and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives.......... 9
Written Statement............................................ 10
Panel 1:
Ms. Gloria M. Shepherd, Associate Administrator, Office of
Planning, Environment, and Realty, Federal Highway
Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation
Oral Statement............................................... 11
Written Statement............................................ 12
Biography.................................................... 25
Mr. Benjamin H. Grumbles, Assistant Administrator for Water, U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency
Oral Statement............................................... 25
Written Statement............................................ 27
Biography.................................................... 33
Discussion....................................................... 34
Panel 2:
Mr. Sam Adams, Commissioner of Public Utilities, City of
Portland, Oregon
Oral Statement............................................... 37
Written Statement............................................ 39
Biography.................................................... 42
Mr. Daniel J. Huffman, Managing Director, National Resources,
National Ready Mixed Concrete Association
Oral Statement............................................... 43
Written Statement............................................ 45
Biography.................................................... 51
Mr. Hal Kassoff, Senior Vice President for Sustainable
Development, Parsons Brinckerhoff
Oral Statement............................................... 51
Written Statement............................................ 53
Biography.................................................... 54
Discussion....................................................... 55
Appendix 1: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Ms. Gloria M. Shepherd, Associate Administrator, Office of
Planning, Environment, and Realty, Federal Highway
Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation.............. 66
Mr. Benjamin H. Grumbles, Assistant Administrator for Water, U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency................................ 70
Mr. Sam Adams, Commissioner of Public Utilities, City of
Portland, Oregon............................................... 74
Mr. Daniel J. Huffman, Managing Director, National Resources,
National Ready Mixed Concrete Association...................... 76
Mr. Hal Kassoff, Senior Vice President for Sustainable
Development, Parsons Brinckerhoff.............................. 80
Appendix 2: Additional Material for the Record
Statement of the Interlocking Concrete Pavement Institute (ICPI). 84
GREEN TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE: CHALLENGES TO ACCESS AND
IMPLEMENTATION
----------
THURSDAY, MAY 10, 2007
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Technology and Innovation,
Committee on Science and Technology,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:30 p.m., in
Room 2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. David Wu
[Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
hearing charter
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Green Transportation Infrastructure:
Challenges to Access and
Implementation
thursday, may 10, 2007
2:00 p.m.-4:00 p.m.
2318 rayburn house office building
1. Purpose
On Thursday, May 10, the Subcommittee on Technology and Innovation
of the Committee on Science and Technology will hold a hearing to
examine options for construction technologies and materials available
for transportation infrastructure that contribute to stormwater
management and control of non-point source water pollution. Federal and
local government officials and industry representatives will also
address barriers to widespread implementation of these technologies.
2. Witnesses
Ms. Gloria Shepherd is the Associate Administrator for Planning,
Environment, and Realty at the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) of
the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT).
Mr. Benjamin Grumbles is the Assistant Administrator for the Office of
Water at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Mr. Sam Adams is the Commissioner of Public Utilities for the City of
Portland, Oregon. His jurisdiction includes the Bureau of Environmental
Services and the Office of Transportation.
Mr. Dan Huffman is the Managing Director for National Resources for the
National Ready Mixed Concrete Association (NRMCA).
Mr. Hal Kassoff is the Senior Vice President for Sustainable
Development at Parsons Brinckerhoff, a leading infrastructure
engineering firm.
3. Brief Overview
Transportation infrastructure such as roads and
parking lots contribute to pollution of ground and surface
water because they are impervious surfaces and collect a high
concentration of contaminants. Stormwater washes pollutants off
of hard surfaces and concentrates runoff into streams, lakes,
and bays without filtration that could mitigate the effect of
the contaminants. In addition, these hard surfaces concentrate
rainfall during storms and empty the flow of water immediately
via storm sewers intro streams, rivers, and lakes, unlike the
slow, natural filtration when rain falls on undeveloped ground.
The results--flooding, increased sedimentation and erosion, and
pollution of ecosystems.
Engineers have developed numerous technologies that
can be incorporated into transportation infrastructure which
contribute to controlling stormwater and mitigating non-point
source water pollution. These green infrastructure technologies
help absorb and filter excess runoff, rather than funneling
runoff into large sewer pipes that empty directly into
detention ponds or water treatment facilities, which can easily
become overwhelmed during heavy rainfall.
There has not been widespread implementation of green
transportation infrastructure by governments or private
industry. There are technical, social, and regulatory barriers
to implementation which are being addressed to some extent by
the Federal Government and private non-profit organizations,
but additional efforts are necessary.
4. Issues and Concerns
What future research is necessary, both in the area of technology
development and testing and evaluation? A common argument against the
use of green transportation infrastructure by governments and private
industry is the lack of data (or the lack of awareness of data)
supporting the claims that these technologies control runoff and reduce
non-point source pollution. Additional testing and evaluation as well
as more robust public awareness campaigns could ease concerns that
green infrastructure technologies are ineffective. Testing and
evaluation should also cover the traditional criteria used to judge
transportation infrastructure: safety, reliability, and cost.
Currently, the EPA depends on outside groups for data collection, and
as a result, data tends to be incomplete and only covers specific
projects, not overall technology performance in a variety of settings.
Because EPA uses performance-based standards to determine whether
technologies effectively contribute to preventing water pollution, the
lack of data makes it especially difficult to get approval to use new
technology from some regional administrators.
The American Association of State Highway and Transportation
Officials (AASHTO) maintains a database of all proposed research
projects proposed by State departments of transportation in the field
of environmental protection. The proposed research is intended to meet
specific needs of transportation officials, and covers broad topics
such as noise, energy, wildlife protection, and water management. In
the area of stormwater management, states have proposed over 30
different research projects that would provide further data and
feedback on the use of green transportation infrastructure. The results
would be a valuable tool for helping convince State and local
transportation officials and private industry of the effectiveness of
these technologies. Unfortunately, research funding is limited, and
many proposed projects are not carried out.
How should a builder determine which type of green transportation
infrastructure technology is most appropriate for their project? How
should that technology be integrated into the overall stormwater
management system? One of the primary reasons builders resist
incorporating green transportation infrastructure technologies into
their design plans is the lack of understanding of the different
options. Given that even EPA regional offices do not have universal
expertise in this area, it is not surprising that builders are
reluctant to invest time and effort in familiarizing themselves with
green technologies. One of the most complicated aspects of planning
designs that incorporate green infrastructure is determining the most
appropriate technologies to use for a particular climate and built
environment. A technology appropriate for a major urban center in the
Northeast would likely not be effective for a more rural area in the
desert Southwest. Additionally, these technologies do not operate
independently, but are most effective when they are integrated into an
overall stormwater management and sewer system. Since the technologies
are relatively new, many builders do not have the expertise necessary
to efficiently integrate the design into an existing water management
system. EPA is working to educate designers and builders through the
use of fact sheets on the various technologies, but additional efforts
are necessary to facilitate broader implementation.
What should the Federal Government do to facilitate adoption of green
transportation infrastructure by State and local governments and
private companies? How can federal agencies coordinate effectively to
maximize use of green technologies? Federal action on the issue of
green transportation infrastructure has been generally limited to
research and development, public awareness campaigns, and demonstration
projects. While these efforts are laudable, the Federal Government
could provide stronger incentives for using these types of technology.
Federal agencies can also set a good example by using green
infrastructure practices at their facilities around the country, thus
demonstrating that these technologies are useful in many climates and
settings around the country.
There are also federal funding sources that could be used to
provide incentives for the use of green infrastructure. In March, the
House passed H.R. 720, the Water Quality Financing Act of 2007, which
authorized the use of EPA grant money--which previously had been
limited to funding traditional stormwater management infrastructure
such as sewer pipes--for green infrastructure. Federal funding for
green transportation infrastructure elements both provides a financial
incentive for their use by states and municipalities and indicates
federal recognition of the technology's effectiveness.
Additionally, better coordination between federal agencies is
necessary to allow new technologies into the marketplace without being
impeded by federal regulations. Currently, some EPA regions do not
allow the use of innovative technologies in spite of work performed by
other federal agencies, including FHWA, that demonstrates their
effectiveness. Improving coordination between R&D agencies and
regulatory agencies can help ensure that technology transfer is not
hampered by outdated regulations.
5. Background
The information in this section is summarized from the National
Cooperative Highway Research Program's 2006 report, Evaluation of Best
Management Practices for Highway Runoff Control.
Environmental Problems Associated With Runoff
Changes in the amount of land covered by surfaces that are
impervious to water, such as roads or parking lots, can have
significant impacts on an area's natural hydrology, potentially
resulting in flooding, pollution, or aquatic ecosystem destruction. Due
to their impermeable nature, roads and parking lots decrease the amount
of rainwater that will infiltrate into the ground, leading to an
increase in the amount of rainwater that runs over the surface of the
ground, referred to as ``surface runoff.'' An area that is fully paved
has on average of 15 to 20 times the amount of runoff as a completely
undeveloped area. Thus, streams, rivers, lakes and other bodies of
surface water receive a greater volume of runoff under developed
conditions than they would under undeveloped conditions. They also
receive the peak flow of this surface runoff much sooner than they
would under natural conditions, where water would filter through
slowly. These changes in volume and timing can degrade the physical
characteristics of streams and rivers. Increases in erosion will widen
channels, decrease the stability of banks, and widen flood plains.
These changes affect the fish and other animals and plants.
Additionally, these changes to the watershed can increase the
possibility that a stream will experience reduced or intermittent flow
during some times of the year, since there is less groundwater to
recharge the stream and the flow of runoff into the stream is no longer
gradual but instead very sharp. Thus, developed areas have a
significant and far-ranging environmental impact.
Runoff from highways contributes to non-point source pollution--the
type of non-localized pollution emission that is responsible for over
80 percent of the degradation of the Nation's surface water. Stormwater
moves over agricultural land, lawns, urban areas, and other types of
human land-use, washing chemicals like fertilizers, heavy metals, and
harmful bacteria into surface water. Highway and other transportation
installations are major contributors to this type of pollution. The
most common contaminants in highway runoff are metals, inorganic salts,
aromatic hydrocarbons (such as the carcinogenic chemical benzene) and
suspended solids that accumulate on the road surface as a result of
regular highway operations and maintenance activities.
Runoff Mitigation Methods
To be an effective tool in countering the negative impact of
rainfall runoff, mitigation measures must reduce the speed and volume
of flow and treat or reduce pollutants. Mitigation techniques rely on
structural and non-structural best management practices (BMPs) to
address these goals. Structural measures are installations like
infiltration basins and trenches, detention and retention ponds,
constructed wetlands, vegetated swales and filter strips, and
filtration systems. Generally they are above ground and rely on passive
methods to accomplish treatment goals. Some highly urbanized areas use
underground, proprietary systems. Non-structural measures are designed
to control runoff and pollution problems at their source; they include
practices such as street sweeping and reductions in fertilizer
applications.
Stormwater managers generally choose their treatment technique by
evaluating the amount of land available, the cost of implementation and
operation and maintenance of the technology, and the treatment
objectives. Attenuation methods, or reducing the size of the peak
runoff flow, can be accomplished by intercepting the rainfall with
vegetation and avoiding overly efficient conveyance systems (such as
large storm drains) and detention ponds. All of these serve the purpose
of slowing the water as it travels to the ground or surface water.
Reductions in stormwater volume can be accomplished with retention,
infiltration and evapo-transpiration (the water lost through
evaporation and plant processes).
Low-impact development is a comprehensive design strategy intended
to maintain the natural hydrology of an area even after roads and other
infrastructure are installed. It embodies the principles of
conservation, minimization of impact, and maintenance of natural
watershed hydrologic timing. Ideally, low impact development should be
designed to replicate pre-development conditions as much as possible.
Current Federal Programs
While most of the decisions regarding implementation of green
transportation infrastructure are made at the State and local level,
there are federal programs addressing the issue of non-point source
water pollution control in transportation infrastructure. The Green
Highways Partnership (GHP) is the primary federal vehicle for
encouraging the use of green transportation infrastructure by State and
local governments and private industry. EPA and FHWA are the chief
federal participants in the partnership, which includes an expanding
list of State departments of transportation, trade organizations,
municipal governments, and non-profit organizations. The Partnership's
activities focus on planning and design, construction, and operations
and maintenance of green transportation infrastructure, and include
pilot projects that demonstrate cost-effective, environmentally-sound
transportation infrastructure technologies that meet State performance
requirements. GHP includes a specific program on watershed-driven
stormwater management which includes the development of best practices
and performance standards, and the collection of data and modeling
results to better understand the benefits of green technologies.
FHWA, through the Surface Transportation Environment and Planning
(STEP) Cooperative Research Program, also conducts research to improve
air quality and climate, wetlands, and water quality and ecosystems as
part of its environmental research initiative. Stormwater-control
related projects include basic research into the contribution of
impervious surfaces to runoff, and development of methods to rapidly
assess the effects of highways on adjoining ecosystems.
Additional research projects are supported through the
Transportation Research Board (TRB), a FHWA-funded arm of the National
Research Council (NRC). As part of the National Cooperative Highway
Research Program, TRB has sponsored evaluations of best management
practices for highway runoff, long term data collections on the effect
of highway construction on habitats, and other projects related to the
effect of transportation infrastructure on non-point source water
pollution. The EPA Office of Water participates in TRB committees, and
assists in the translation of research results into usable manuals and
guides for State and local agencies.
The EPA Office of Water also supports the use of green
infrastructure through the National Menu of Storm Water Best Practices,
a web-based database of stormwater management options for local
authorities. EPA developed this database beginning in 2000. The
database includes information and builder specifications for a variety
of green transportation infrastructure technologies. The Office of
Water has also begun cooperating with environmental non-profit
organizations to promote the use of these practices among local
governments. They provide additional support to State and local
governments through the development of fact sheets that specify which
technologies are suited to various environments around the country.
6. Challenges to Implementation
Though research has shown significant benefits in terms of
stormwater management and control of non-point source water pollution,
technologies such as bio-swales and pervious pavement have not been
adopted in many jurisdictions or by private entities. There are
numerous barriers to full adoption of green infrastructure, including
technical problems, regulatory challenges, and general industry
resistance to changing practices.
Technical Challenges
The installation of green transportation infrastructure can be
impeded by problems of high cost and availability of space for
technologies. For measures that are installed directly on the roadway,
unless new infrastructure is being constructed, there are high costs
associated with removing old materials and installing new surfaces.
Additionally, the disruption to traffic and business is extremely
costly. In many urban areas, there is also not space on the roadside or
around parking lots to install measures such as bio-swales, limiting
local governments' choices of technology.
Various climates can also present unique challenges to
implementation. In areas where very cold weather is common,
technologies that retain water for slow filtration are susceptible to
freezing. Freeze/thaw cycles can shorten the lifespan of
infrastructure, as well as limiting its ability to effectively filter
pollutants from runoff. Further research will help develop better
guidelines as to which technologies are most appropriate for various
climates.
Regulatory Challenges
Federal, State, and local government agencies have taken an active
role in promoting the use of green transportation infrastructure, but
paradoxically, those same entities have often erected regulatory
barriers which prevent widespread implementation. On the federal level,
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has begun promoting the
use of green infrastructure, including transportation infrastructure,
through its Office of Water. In March 2007, Assistant Administrator Ben
Grumbles released a memo to regional administrators encouraging the
acceptance of green infrastructure to protect water quality (Appendix
I). The EPA also recently signed an agreement with a number of
environmental organizations to assist State and local governments in
implementing green infrastructure projects.
However, though the Office of Water has been a strong advocate for
green infrastructure projects, there are regulatory barriers internal
to the EPA that prevent those projects from moving forward. Through the
Clean Water Act, the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System
(NPDES) permit program gives EPA the authority to regulate sources of
water that release pollutants into ground and surface water. The
program is administered on a regional level, and regional
administrators have discretion over defining a green infrastructure
technology as a source of water that is covered by NPDES. If
technologies such as pervious pavement or bio-swales, which filter
runoff before it flows into the ground or surface water, are considered
``point sources'' that inject water directly into the ground. EPA
regulations require permitting procedures that act as a significant
disincentive to use these technologies.
For example, when the City of Portland was preparing its ``Clean
River Plan'' for the Willamette River in 2000 and 2001, the city
planners wanted to incorporate bio-swales as part of the runoff
management plan. However, the EPA regional administrator was not
familiar with research results which indicated that bio-swales
effectively filtered pollutants from runoff, and required extensive
permitting and monitoring systems under the NPDES authority, thus
creating a financial disincentive for the use of bio-swales.
Conversely, in other regions, EPA regional administrators have taken a
leadership role, reducing the bureaucratic barriers to implementing
projects using green infrastructure. The Office of Water's initiative
has a goal of standardizing implementation procedures across the
various regions.
State and local authorities can sometimes also be at fault in
preventing implementation of green transportation infrastructure, but
unlike federal laws that specifically disallow the use of green
technologies without extensive permitting, State and local authorities
tend to fail to explicitly allow their use. As a result, governments or
private companies within the jurisdiction who propose the use of green
transportation infrastructure are not given approval simply because the
innovative technologies have not been previously considered by the
regulating authority. The problem is then self-perpetuating, as these
local governments block all potential demonstration projects, and then
continue to deny builders on the basis that there have been no
successful demonstration projects. Of course, many cities have acted as
leaders in the green transportation infrastructure initiative, but the
challenge remains to universalize its use across local jurisdictions.
Social Challenges
Finally, there are social challenges to widespread implementation
of green transportation infrastructure. The transportation construction
industry is highly decentralized, and stakeholders range from State
governments to private developers. As a whole, the industry tends to be
risk-averse, and hence reluctant to adopt technologies that may be
considered experimental or unproven because of concerns about high
cost, reliability, maintenance, or simply confusion about the best
products to use. The slow adoption of these technologies has also led
to a shortage of trained contractors who are able to properly design
and install integrated systems, making implementation more difficult
and costly.
Numerous companies, non-profits, and industry organizations have
developed programs to specifically promote environmentally-friendly
advances in construction techniques and technologies with varying
levels of success. Market-driven techniques are most effective:
demonstrating that green transportation infrastructure is attractive to
consumers as part of a corporate citizenship initiative has been an
effective means of encouraging implementation. For example, Turner
Construction Company, one of the largest construction companies in the
United States, recently worked with Wal-Mart to develop a ``green
supercenter'' which incorporated green transportation elements such as
bio-swales and pervious pavement as part of an overall sustainability
initiative that was formulated to build community goodwill. The EPA and
FHWA, through the Transportation Research Board (TRB), have also
dedicated some resources towards training programs, but the scope of
these programs is limited because of budgetary constraints.
Chairman Wu. I call the Subcommittee to order. I would like
to welcome everyone to this hearing on Green Transportation
Infrastructure: Challenges to Access and Implementation.
The Committee has heard a lot of testimony over the last
five months on high-tech methods to mitigate climate change.
Today, I want to hear about simpler methods for protecting our
lakes, rivers, and oceans. I have invited today's witnesses
because they each give a unique perspective in the field of
green transportation infrastructure.
Now, this is a term that is not necessarily well known
outside of environmental circles. Simply put, green
transportation infrastructure is the use of materials, methods,
and methods for construction of roads, highways, and parking
lots that minimize environmental impact. Today, we will hear
about the materials and technologies that specifically
contribute to the minimization of non-point source water
pollution.
Runoff is a major contributor to water pollution,
especially from roads and parking lots, which concentrate oil,
gasoline, heavy metals, and other pollutants, which then flow
unimpeded into our nation's waterways. For example, a one acre
parking lot produces 16 times the runoff of a one acre meadow.
In recent years, local governments and companies and private
citizens have been working to develop simple, yet innovative
solutions that integrate control of non-point source water
pollution into the existing infrastructure. The results, a
common sense, low cost, low maintenance system that reduces
pollution, prevents flooding, protects ecosystems, and
maintains a more natural hydrological environment.
I would like to thank our witnesses for testifying today.
Our challenge today is not the development of new technologies.
It is to get people to start using the technologies that we do
have. I hope that at the end of this hearing, that we have
learned a lot about technologies for controlling non-point
source water pollution that can be integrated into
transportation infrastructure. I am shortening my opening
statement in the interests of adjusting to the flex of our
Committee schedule and our Floor schedule, and I will submit my
full statement into the record.
I would like to recognize my good colleague from Georgia,
Dr. Gingrey, the Ranking Member of this committee, for his
opening statement.
[The prepared statement of Chairman Wu follows:]
Prepared Statement of Chairman David Wu
I would like to call the Subcommittee to order.
I want to welcome everyone to this morning's hearing on Green
Transportation Infrastructure: Challenges to Access and Implementation.
The Committee has heard a lot of testimony over the last five months on
high-tech ways to mitigate climate change. Today I want to hear about
simpler methods for protecting our lakes, rivers and oceans. I've
invited today's witnesses because they each a unique perspective in the
field of green transportation infrastructure. Now this is a term that
is not necessarily well known outside of environmental circles. Simply
put, green transportation infrastructure is the use of materials and
methods for construction of roads, highways, and parking lots that
minimize environmental impact. Today we will hear about the materials
and technologies that specifically contribute to the minimization of
non-point source water pollution.
Runoff is a major contributor to water pollution, especially from
roads and parking lots which concentrate oil, gasoline, heavy metals,
and other pollutants which then flow unimpeded into our nation's water.
For example, a one-acre parking lot produces 16 times the runoff of a
one-acre meadow. In recent years, local governments, companies, and
private citizens have been working to develop simple yet innovative
solutions that integrate control of non-point source water pollution
into the existing infrastructure. The results: a common sense, low
cost, low maintenance system that reduces pollution, prevents flooding,
protects ecosystems, and maintains a more natural hydrological
environment.
On paper, these technologies look like no-brainers. So why don't we
see them used more often? While there are technological issues and
research that needs to be carried out to prove their effectiveness, the
biggest impediments are State and federal regulations. Clean water is
regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency on a regional basis,
and some regional administrators, including in my home district of
Portland, are not familiar with the benefits of using green
infrastructure for filtering runoff. Because of they have discretion to
approve or disapprove technologies, some of these administrators tend
to rely on standard operating procedures and steer clear of innovative
solutions. We'll hear this afternoon from Assistant Administrator Ben
Grumbles of the EPA's Office of Water, who is taking the lead at his
agency to educate the EPA regional administrators across the country
about green infrastructure technologies. I hope to be able to work with
Assistant Administrator Grumbles to promote the implementation of green
transportation infrastructure projects across the country.
We also need to see better coordination among the federal agencies
working on the R&D and regulatory aspects of green transportation
infrastructure. Technology development must not happen in a vacuum. The
DOT, EPA, universities, and other stakeholders must work together to
make sure that technology fits into the current regulatory structure.
Likewise, regulators must be flexible enough to evaluate technology
according to its performance. In addition, the Federal Government
should take the lead in training the private sector to insist on the
use of green technologies for all new developments.
Thank you again to our witnesses for testifying today. Our
challenge today is not to development new technologies. It's to get
people to start using the technologies we've got. I hope at the end of
this hearing that we've learned a lot about technologies for
controlling non-point source water pollution that can be integrated
into transportation infrastructure. I hope we also gain a better
understanding of how to facilitate implementation of these technologies
in the public and private sectors to better protect our nation's
precious water. I'd now like to recognize my colleague, Ranking Member
Gingrey, for an opening statement.
Mr. Gingrey. Mr. Chairman, thank you, and I thank the
witnesses. I apologize to the witnesses. I had memorized my 18
page opening statement, and in the interest of time, my staff
has redacted it so much now that I am going to have to read it,
because it is a different statement. But thank you so much, Mr.
Chairman, for having this important hearing.
Roads and highways let people in the smallest towns reach
out to the largest cities. They let urban workers escape to
more tranquil homes outside of the city, and they let mom and
pop stores in Cedartown, Georgia, in my district, ship their
wares easily, quickly, and affordably. In short, they form the
fabric that keeps this country connected and competitive.
Unfortunately, roads and highways have also left an
indelible mark on our environment. Today, I am looking forward
to hearing our distinguished panel discuss how we can further
reduce, maybe even negate environmental degradation associated
with our transportation system. From reviewing your testimony,
it appears that green or sustainable highway technologies could
be a win-win for everyone involved. However, it is also clear
that we are not quite there yet.
And I would like to close by, again, thanking you for
coming before the Committee today to discuss this very, very
important topic. I am looking forward to hearing your thoughts,
and starting a dialogue with you on how we can improve our
nation's environment and support our critical highway
infrastructure.
And Mr. Chairman, I will yield back the balance of my time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Gingrey follows:]
Prepared Statement of Representative Phil Gingrey
Thank you Mr. Chairman and I want to also thank our panel of
witnesses for taking the time to be with us here today.
Roads and highways have left an indelible mark on our nation's
history and character, promoting an unprecedented freedom to travel,
trade, and prosper. Indeed, the family car trip remains an icon of
holiday festivities. . .along of course with the inevitable cries of,
``Are we there yet?'' from the back seat.
Our nation's transportation infrastructure not only allows the
cross-country trek to Grandma's house, but also allows our local
grocery stores to sell fruits and vegetables from across the state,
across the country, and indeed also from across the world.
Roads and highways let people in the smallest towns reach out to
the largest cities. They let urban workers escape to more tranquil
homes outside the city. And they let a mom and pop store in Cedartown,
GA ship their wares easily, quickly, and affordably. In short, they
form the fabric that keeps this country connected and competitive.
Unfortunately, roads and highways have also left an indelible mark
on our environment. Air and water quality can suffer from poorly
designed or over-used roads as tailpipe emissions accumulate in the
air--and oil, dust, and chemicals seep into the watershed. Road
construction itself can damage ecosystems, clouding streams with dirt
and debris or filling in wetlands that protect from flooding and
provide precious habitat.
Over the years, local, State, and Federal governments have acted to
contain these harms by requiring environmentally responsible planning
and development and investing in cleaner and greener technologies and
construction techniques.
Today, I'm looking forward to hearing our distinguished panel
discuss how to further reduce, maybe even negate, environmental
degradation associated with our transportation system. From reviewing
your testimony, it appears that green or sustainable highway
technologies could be a win-win for everyone involved. However, it's
also clear that we're not quite there yet.
There are a few key points that I hope we can discuss today. First,
your testimony points out that measures to improve highways must be
tailored to that particular road, taking into account the local terrain
and weather, the broader ecosystem and watershed, and the expected use
of the road.
With all these variables at play, we can't just assume that
particular green highway technologies or practices will be effective
everywhere. So, do we currently have data that is robust enough to meet
the needs of highway administrators and engineers in both Georgia and
North Dakota? If not, do we have a research plan to help make these
technologies viable?
Second, implementing these new technologies and practices will
require close cooperation between large groups of stakeholders;
contractors, highway and environmental administrators at the federal,
State, and local level, as well as community residents.
Communicating and coordinating with a large and diverse group like
this is challenging in any circumstance, and I'd like to hear the
panel's thoughts on how green highway practices can be better
disseminated across the country.
I'd like to close by again thanking you for coming before the
Committee today to discuss this important topic. I'm looking forward to
hearing your thoughts and starting a dialogue with you on how we can
improve our nation's environment and support our critical highway
infrastructure.
Mr. Chairman, I'll yield the balance of my time.
Chairman Wu. Thank you very much, Dr. Gingrey. Our first
witness is Ms. Gloria Shepherd, who is the Associate
Administrator for Planning, Environment, and Realty at the
Federal Highway Administration.
Let us see. We also have Mr. Ben Grumbles, who in addition
to being the Assistant Administrator of the Office of Water at
the Environmental Protection Agency is an alumni of the Science
and Technology Committee staff. Welcome back.
I also have a special welcome for our next two witnesses,
who both come from Oregon. City Commissioner Sam Adams was
elected to the Portland City Council in 2005. He oversees the
Office of Transportation and the Bureau of Environmental
Services. He has taken the lead in developing a citywide green-
streets policy, which requires green street development for all
newly constructed or reconstructed roadways. Welcome, Sam.
Mr. Dan Huffman is the Managing Director for National
Resources for the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association,
and also comes from Portland, Oregon.
Our final witness is Mr. Hal Kassoff, who is a Senior Vice
President at Parsons Brinckerhoff, a leading construction firm.
And with that, Ms. Shepherd, please proceed.
Panel 1:
STATEMENT OF MS. GLORIA M. SHEPHERD, ASSOCIATE ADMINISTRATOR,
OFFICE OF PLANNING, ENVIRONMENT, AND REALTY, FEDERAL HIGHWAY
ADMINISTRATION, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
Ms. Shepherd. Chairman Wu, Ranking Member Gingrey, and
Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to
testify today about the Federal Highway Administration's
efforts to advance environmentally sensitive transportation
infrastructure.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to testify about ways
in which FHWA is advancing a shift in the focus of the highway
community from simply mitigating environmental impacts to
proactively contributing to environmental enhancements. To
fulfill this responsibility, we work closely with our partners
at the federal, State, and local levels to provide coordinated
national research, and to deliver research results through
training, and technical assistance.
Minimizing damage from and mitigating negative impacts of
transportation facilities on the human and natural environment
are always significant considerations for every federal-aid
funded highway project, from the initial planning and project
development throughout the design, construction, operation, and
maintenance stages. Our State partners are learning from
experiences that introducing environmentally sound technologies
and construction considerations early in the project
development process can produce savings in costs and time, and
can reduce future remediation expenses.
As more transportation environmental research is being
undertaken by a diverse array of organizations, there is a
growing need for organizational approaches to make the results
more visible. FHWA participates in a variety of research
coordination efforts, including the Surface Transportation
Environment and Planning Cooperative Research Program, better
known STEPCRP, our National Highway courses, our Local and
Tribal Technical Assistance Programs, and through development
of case studies to show case best practice and innovative
techniques.
FHWA is also becoming an active participant in the Green
Infrastructure Planning Workshops developed by a number of
resource and regulatory agencies in cooperation with the
Conservation Fund. We are a leading partner in the Mid-Atlantic
Green Highway Partnership. FHWA is actively working with the
interagency teams of the Green Highway Partnerships in the area
of stormwater runoff management, recycling, re-use of
industrial byproduct materials, and conservation and ecosystem
management.
In our efforts to promote technologies that mitigate damage
and impacts on environment from highway construction and
operations, we have made the issue of managing highway
stormwater runoff a particular focus. While highway runoffs may
be a potential threat, there are a number of highly effective
measures, structural and nonstructural, available to treat
runoff before it actually reached any receiving waters.
Site-specific practices remain important treatment options,
but we are increasingly focusing our practice and techniques
that look at ecosystem level impacts. At selecting the most
appropriate management practice, FHWA encourages states to
study the amount of time, type of their highway runoff, and
availability of land, and the physical characteristics on the
site before designing any control strategies for a specific
area.
One challenge that is facing us, as we work to expand
acceptance in the use of environmentally sensitive
technologies, is the lack of a sufficient track record
illustrating the costs versus the benefits of various
technologies. The business case has to be made that new
transportation technologies can be utilized safely in an
environmentally sensitive manner. Context-sensitive solutions
that fully integrate safety into the project development
process can assure both environmental and highway safety
benefits.
When appropriately applied, green transportation
technologies and practices, such as highway infrastructure to
mitigate stormwater runoff, beneficial re-use of industrial
byproduct materials, and context-sensitive solutions not only
help to avoid or mitigate negative environmental impacts of
highway constructions, but can produce safety enhancements and
economic savings as well.
Mr. Chairman, Members, thank you for the opportunity to
testify. I would be pleased to answer any questions that you
may have.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Shepherd follows:]
Prepared Statement of Gloria M. Shepherd
Chairman Wu, Ranking Member Gingrey, and Members of the
Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today about the
Federal Highway Administration's (FHWA) efforts to advance
environmentally sensitive transportation infrastructure. FHWA is
fostering a continued shift in the focus of the highway community from
simply mitigating environmental impacts to actively contributing to
environmental improvements. In fulfilling this responsibility, we work
closely with our partners at the federal, State, and local levels to
provide a coordinated national research agenda and deliver research
results through training and technical assistance
Following the direction provided by the National Environmental
Policy Act (NEPA), FHWA and the State departments of transportation
(DOTs) have become proactive partners in the environmental area. The
Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A
Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU) expanded the focus of environmental
considerations from project development, construction, and operations,
to the area of transportation planning. SAFETEA-LU also contains a
number of provisions to improve coordination between transportation and
resource agencies. Minimizing damage from, and mitigating negative
impacts of, transportation facilities on the human and natural
environments are always significant considerations for every federal-
aid funded highway project, from the initial planning and design
stages, through development and construction, to operation and
maintenance.
Our State partners are learning from experience that introducing
environmentally sound technologies and construction practices early in
project development can produce savings in costs and in time to
completion, and can reduce future remediation expenses. FHWA and its
partners have made substantial contributions to the natural environment
and to communities, through planning and programs that support context
sensitive solutions, stormwater management, beneficial re-use of
industrial byproducts materials, wetland banking, habitat restoration,
historic preservation, air quality improvements, bicycle and pedestrian
facilities, wildlife crossings, and public and tribal government
involvement in transportation project development.
FHWA will continue to support these programs while it also works
with State, local, and federal partners to conduct sound environmental
reviews in a timely way. With prompt decision-making, we routinely
reduce project cost escalation, ease congestion, and deliver the
transportation and safety improvements that the American public
expects.
Research Programs for Environmentally Sound Practices and Technologies
Working with its partners, FHWA supports a research and technology
program that is focused on developing and implementing an
environmentally sensitive transportation program.
State Planning and Research (SP&R) Program. Section 505 of title
23, United States Code, requires that states set aside two percent of
the apportionments from the Interstate Maintenance, National Highway
System, Surface Transportation, Highway Safety Improvement, Highway
Bridge, Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement, and Equity
Bonus programs for State planning and research activities. Of this
amount, states must allocate 25 percent for research, development, and
technology, unless the state certifies that transportation planning
expenditures will require more than 75 percent of the amount set aside.
In fiscal year 2006, the set aside amounted to almost $600 million and,
thus, provided almost $150 million for the State Planning and Research
(SP&R) Program. SP&R-funded activities involve researching new areas of
knowledge, adapting findings to practical applications by developing
new technologies, transferring the technologies, and training the users
of the technologies.
The SP&R Program is intended to solve problems identified by the
states. State DOTs are encouraged to establish research, development,
and training programs that anticipate and address transportation
concerns before they become critical problems. Each state must
implement a program that ensures effective use of available SP&R funds
on a statewide basis, and each state is permitted to tailor its program
to meet local needs. High priority is given to applied research on
State or regional problems, transfer of technology from researcher to
user, and research for setting standards and specifications. Major
research and development areas include infrastructure renewal
(including pavement, structures, and asset management); activities
relating to safety, operations, and management; environmental and real
estate planning; and policy analysis and systems monitoring.
State DOTs have used SP&R funds for substantial research into
regional stormwater issues and development of best management practices
suitable for the particular issues in that locality or state. An
example of ongoing research related to stormwater at the State level is
an ``Investigation of Stormwater Quality Improvements Utilizing
Permeable Pavement and/or Porous Friction Courses,'' which is being
sponsored by the Texas DOT using SP&R funds.
Surface Transportation Environment and Planning Cooperative
Research Program (STEP). At the national level, FHWA currently
administers environment and planning research funds under the STEP
program created by SAFETEA-LU in section 5207. STEP is intended to
improve understanding of the complex relationship between surface
transportation, planning, and the environment. The program is
authorized at $16.875 million per year for fiscal years 2006 through
2009.
Current initiatives propose research in areas related to planning,
air quality, noise abatement, wetlands, vegetation management, wildlife
connectivity, brownfields, and stormwater. Some specific stormwater
initiatives are the International Storm Water Best Management Practices
Database, Evaluation and Update of FHWA Pollutant Loadings Model for
Highway Stormwater Runoff, and Synthesis on the Fate and Effects of
Chloride from Road Salt Applied to Highways for Deicing. Other proposed
research would examine tools such as Geographic Information Systems
(GIS) and Global Positioning Systems (GPS) to better map important
ecosystem features, including wildlife corridors and invasive plants,
to improve our ability to recognize and address environmental concerns
very early in the process of planning a project.
Center for Environmental Excellence. In section 5309, SAFETEA-LU
authorizes $1.25 million per year for fiscal years 2006 through 2009 to
establish a Center for Environmental Excellence to provide technical
assistance, information sharing of best practices, and training in the
use of tools and decision-making processes that can assist states in
planning and delivering environmentally sound surface transportation
projects. FHWA is currently reviewing proposals from universities and
expects to announce the establishment of the new Center for Excellence
shortly.
Infrastructure Research and Technology. FHWA's infrastructure
research and technology programs also pursue initiatives with potential
environmental benefits, including:
Cantilever construction of bridges, which keeps
construction equipment out of the waterway.
Prefabricated technologies for construction and
repair of infrastructure (bridges and pavements) and other
accelerated construction technologies which reduce
environmental impacts by (a) moving much of the construction
process to controlled environments and (b) reducing the
duration of damaging activities.
``Warm mix'' technology for asphalt paving which
reduces the temperature at which asphalt paving materials are
manufactured and placed, thereby reducing both emissions and
fuel consumption. This technology also has the potential to
increase the amount of recycled asphalt pavement that can be
effectively used in the paving mixture.
FHWA promotes and supports the use of recycled materials in highway
construction and, through our contractor, the Recycled Materials
Resource Center, currently at the University of New Hampshire, we are
making changes in the extent of use of several industrial by-product
materials in highway construction. FHWA also has an active Recycling
Team that works with the states, the Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA), and industry to implement recycling technology.
Funding for these initiatives comes from several sources, including
the Innovative Pavement Research and Deployment Program and the
Innovative Bridge Research and Deployment Program. The Highways for
LIFE program will also contribute to implementation of these
technologies.
Research Coordination, Training and Technical Assistance, and
Partnerships
Coordination. As more transportation and environmental research is
being undertaken by a diverse array of organizations, there is a
growing need for organized approaches that support well-crafted
research agendas. FHWA hosts, funds, or participates in various
research coordination efforts. FHWA's STEP program is a cooperative
research program, and stakeholders were extensively engaged in defining
the research agenda and identifying focus areas and projects. In
addition to FHWA's STEP program, National and State-level research
programs of particular interest to State DOT transportation and
environmental practitioners include the Strategic Highway Research
Program Two (SHRP-2) led by the Transportation Research Board (TRB);
the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) research
programs, including the 25-25 research initiative, which provides
funding for quick turnaround research by American Association of State
Highway and Transportation Officials' (AASHTO) Standing Committee on
Environment; individual State DOTs' research programs, which
increasingly include environmental components that are often conducted
in coordination with university partners; and university research,
particularly practitioner-oriented research conducted by University
Transportation Centers around the Nation that receive funding
authorized under SAFETEA-LU.
An additional key area of investment is the AASHTO Center for
Environmental Excellence Transportation Environmental Research Ideas
(TERI) Database. TERI is a dynamic tool that helps practitioners keep
track of and prioritize constantly evolving transportation and
environmental research needs.
Training and Technical Assistance. Important components of a
coordinated research agenda are training and technical assistance. FHWA
is working with our partners at all levels to share research results
and promote environmentally sound practices.
The FHWA's National Highway Institute (NHI) has developed courses
addressing environmental issues associated with infrastructure
construction, operation, and maintenance, including a number of courses
relating to water quality and runoff. Development of courses in these
areas is coordinated with the appropriate federal agencies--most often
EPA, the United States Army Corps of Engineers, and the United States
Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS)--and with representatives of State
DOTs. Courses include ``Design and Implementation of Erosion and
Sediment Control,'' ``Water Quality Management of Highway Runoff, and
``Managing Road Impacts on Stream Ecosystems: An Interdisciplinary
Approach.'' Attached to this statement is a summary of research related
to stormwater runoff, directly carried out, funded, or supported by
FHWA, which provides additional information on these courses. (See
Attachment--``Status of Current FHWA Water Quality Research.'')
FHWA will be developing a NHI short course entitled ``Environmental
Factors of Construction and Maintenance.'' The course is intended to
familiarize construction teams with environmental concerns to be
addressed as part of construction and maintenance operations. The scope
of work for the training has been prepared, and a request for proposals
will be issued shortly. This is the latest of several courses developed
and offered by FHWA's NHI relating to water quality and runoff. The
Attachment also includes additional information on this course.
Technical assistance is also available through FHWA's Resource
Center technical teams and through the Local Technical Assistance
Program (LTAP) and Tribal Technical Assistance Program (TTAP). The
latter two organizations represent 58 centers that work directly with
local agencies to transfer technology and train practitioners at city,
town, county, and tribal levels.
In addition, FHWA has developed case studies to showcase best
practices or innovative techniques. Transportation enhancement funds
have often been used for projects that improve the quality of highway
stormwater runoff. The Sebago Lake-Route 35 Environmental Mitigation in
Standish, Maine; the Santa Monica Urban Runoff Recycling Facility; and
the Rock Creek Watershed Restoration, Montgomery County, Maryland, are
three examples of such projects showcased on our transportation
enhancements website.
We also showcase important water quality improvement projects or
mitigation measures in our Environmental Excellence Awards Program and
our Exemplary Ecosystem Initiatives. An example is the Berthoud Pass
Mountain Access Project in Colorado. This project received the 2005
Environmental Excellence Award for Roadside Resource Management and
Maintenance. Prior to this project, the sediment and de-icing materials
needed for safety considerations on U.S. Highway 40, as it passed
through the mountains in northwest Colorado, were pushed into the
forest floor causing streams to fill up and clogging pipes. Now, when
Colorado DOT maintenance crews plow the highway in the winter, snow and
sand travel through a sophisticated system of culverts and ditches to
collect in a strategically placed concrete storage basin. Once in the
basins, the sand is allowed to settle out and clean water is released
into the watershed below the highway. Colorado DOT crews then recover
the sand from sloped access ramps, and the process begins again.
Partnerships. FHWA has actively supported a multi-agency effort to
develop a non-prescriptive approach to making infrastructure more
sensitive to wildlife and ecosystems through greater agency cooperative
conservation. The collaborative ecosystem approach to transportation
development is described in ``Eco-Logical: an Ecosystem Approach to
Developing Infrastructure Projects.'' FHWA currently has dedicated $1
million for grants to transportation agencies, local governments, non-
governmental organizations, and others to advance pilot projects based
on Eco-Logical and integrated planning principles. Integrated planning
is a process for the collection, sharing, analysis, and presentation of
data contained in agencies' plans--conservation, watershed, historic
preservation, transportation, and others--to more comprehensively
address the multiple needs of an area. The solicitation for these
grants is expected to be posted at http://www.grants.gov/ and several
FHWA websites in the next few days.
National Partnerships are also being promoted through workshops on
Linking Conservation and Transportation Planning and Project
Development. Pilot workshops were held last year in Arizona, Colorado,
and Arkansas. The workshop content is being updated and workshops will
be offered again in fiscal year 2008. The purposes of the workshops are
to (1) facilitate the exchange of ideas, concepts, and methods for
better collaboration between transportation and conservation planning
practitioners and (2) promote the sharing of conservation and
transportation geospatial data, methodologies, and tools to advance
planning, environmental stewardship, and streamlining goals. The
primary audience for the training will be conservation and
transportation planning and project review/development staffs at the
federal, State, regional, and local levels.
FHWA is also becoming an active participant in the Green
Infrastructure Planning Workshops developed by a number of resource and
regulatory agencies in cooperation with the Conservation Fund. Green
infrastructure relates to a strategic approach to conservation that
promotes planning, protection, restoration, and long-term management
that is proactive, systematic, holistic, multi-functional, and science-
based. Green Infrastructure workshops approach transportation planning
as a way of promoting integrated planning principles. FHWA has provided
funding support for Green Infrastructure Workshops held recently in
Anchorage, Alaska, and Colorado Springs, Colorado.
FHWA has been a leading partner in the Mid-Atlantic Green Highways
Partnership (GHP). The GHP is a public-private initiative that seeks to
revolutionize the manner in which our nation's transportation
infrastructure is planned and constructed. The GHP promotes integrated
planning, regulatory flexibility, and market-based rewards. The GHP
provides State DOTs an opportunity to highlight good environmental
practices already underway and encourages additional innovations.
FHWA has contributed significant resources towards the partnership
including staff time, monetary commitments, and technological
expertise. Recently, FHWA and EPA co-founded a Green Highways
Partnership grant for innovative watershed management projects within
the Anacostia Watershed. The grant, announced on Earth Day 2006,
awarded a total of $1 million to three different groups working on
projects designed to protect and restore urban water resources through
a holistic watershed approach to managing water quality. The grant
supports Low Impact Development and restoration work in the Anacostia
River watershed. This partnership represents significant leveraging of
public, private, and non-profit resources, while playing a pivotal role
in advancing environmental results; safe, sustainable transportation
systems; and economic competitiveness in and around the Anacostia
watershed in D.C. and Maryland.
Another recent event was a GHP workshop with Maryland that reviewed
a project in the early Environmental Impact Statement stage to discuss
stormwater management, conservation practices, and recycle/re-use of
industrial byproducts, with a focus on what can then be used in the
construction plans for the project.
In addition to work on stormwater runoff management, FHWA is
collaborating with the multi-disciplinary, interagency teams of the GHP
in the following areas:
Recycling and Reuse. Recycling of industrial byproducts and their
re-use as materials for infrastructure construction can not only reduce
a wide range of environmental impacts (conserve landfill, reduce water/
air pollution, reduce greenhouse gases), but can also save energy,
money, and conserve non-renewable resources. The GHP recycling and re-
use team has a number of efforts underway, primarily to overcome
informational barriers. After identifying and evaluating existing
environmental regulations and construction/material specifications, the
team will develop guidance documents for State and local agencies on
the best methods and specifications for the use of industrial byproduct
materials in road and bridge construction. The team will also produce a
comprehensive toolkit that provides technical information and guidance
to help DOTs and regulatory agencies overcome barriers.
Another GHP priority is to highlight existing State DOT projects
that optimize the beneficial re-use of industrial byproducts. An
example of a project that has been showcased through the GHP is the
Tarrtown Bridge in Pennsylvania, where the Pennsylvania DOT used
shredded tires as lightweight embankment fill on two bridge approaches.
The project incorporated approximately 780,000 scrap tires, thereby
easing the load on landfills.
In West Virginia, the State DOT is using recycled blast furnace
slag as the aggregate of choice in the western part of the state for
the majority of the asphalt surface course pavements. The effort
results in a safer pavement due to the aggregate's non-polishing
properties (higher friction number). Further, recycling blast furnace
slag, when available locally, offers an economic advantage compared
with using virgin limestone aggregate.
These are just two examples of the various industrial byproduct
materials that FHWA is actively promoting for re-use in highway and
bridge construction. As noted above, the Recycled Materials Resource
Center mission is to conduct research to insure that the use of
recycled materials does not have a negative impact on the environment
and to provide technical information to State and local agencies on the
proper re-use of the materials.
Conservation and Ecosystem Management (principles and practices).
The conservation and ecosystem management team within the GHP focuses
on bringing advances in mapping and data management together with
various initiatives in conservation and ecosystem management to achieve
greener highways. The data and regulatory managers are working to gain
agreement on how to develop a set of tailored, core data-sets and maps
that can be integrated at both the transportation project and planning
levels. The maps will facilitate information sharing at the federal,
State, metropolitan planning organization, and local levels, and will
facilitate the integration of conservation and ecosystem management
practices into land-use planning. Priority areas for conservation will
emerge from the development of a regional ecosystem framework.
The Green Highways Partnership represents the next logical step in
the evolution of EPA, FHWA, and Mid-Atlantic State DOT efforts in
environmental streamlining and stewardship.
Management of Highway Stormwater Runoff
FHWA has made the issue of managing stormwater runoff a particular
focus in its efforts to promote technologies that mitigate damage and
impacts to the environment from highway construction and operation.
Highway stormwater runoff, as part of development and urbanization,
is a potential source of a wide variety of possible pollutants to
surrounding water bodies. Highway surfaces, along with adjoining areas,
collect a variety of materials as a result of highway usage,
maintenance, natural conditions, and pollution fallout. While highway
runoff may be a potential threat to receiving waters, if handled
properly the runoff does not have to be a serious problem.
There are a number of highly effective measures available to treat
the runoff before it actually reaches any receiving waters. Site-
specific practices remain important treatment options, but a changing
management style has also embraced the practice of planning at the
watershed and sub-basin scales. Best management practices are no longer
driven only by water-quality criteria. We are not looking only at ``end
of the pipe'' treatment technologies but, increasingly, are focusing on
practices and techniques that look at ecosystem-level impacts and
stressors, such as conserving ecosystems, maintaining natural drainage
courses, and minimizing cleared and graded area.
FHWA researches and showcases the various best management practices
for managing stormwater runoff from highway projects. These best
management practices can generally be categorized as ``structural'' or
``non-structural.''
Structural best management practices consist of infiltration
technologies, detention, retention, vegetative practices, filtering
systems, and porous pavements. Structural best management practices
operate by physically trapping runoff until contaminants settle out or
are filtered through the underlying soils. They work through gravity
settling the constituents, the infiltration of soluble nutrients
through the soil or filters, or other biological and chemical
processes.
Stormwater management innovations are underway throughout the mid-
Atlantic region, where urbanized areas are particularly challenging. In
2004 in Washington, D.C., the District Department of Transportation
installed a biocell for stormwater management at Benning Road Bridge. A
biocell is composed of natural materials such as mulch, soil mix, and
various types of vegetation. Rather than require an engineered
structure like a weir or drainage pit, a biocell acts like a filtration
trench, where the soil or natural drainage materials filter the water.
A biocell can remove up to 90 percent of the suspended solids from
stormwater. This project represented the first use of low-impact
stormwater management technology by the District government.
The non-structural best management practices deal mainly with
source controls such as land use planning, street sweeping, fertilizer
application controls, reduced mowing, and litter removal from roads and
roadside areas. These methods help reduce the initial concentration and
accumulation of contaminants in the stormwater runoff. Non-structural
controls can reduce the need for structural controls.
Many states, including Oregon, have implemented a requirement that
any engineered stormwater facility, such as detention, treatment,
pumping, or infiltration, must be accompanied by a site specific
``Operation & Maintenance'' manual. This manual is necessary to ensure
the agreements and assumptions made during the water resources analysis
conducted during the NEPA environmental review process are fulfilled
for the life of the facility. The manual is provided to the people
responsible for the long-term maintenance of the facility.
FHWA's promotion and technical support for more environmentally
sensitive use of de-icing agents and chemicals, as well as abrasion use
for winter road maintenance activities, is saving operating budgets and
increasing roadway asset service life, with less impact on the roadside
environment. We find a similar payoff for improvements in summer work
managing the roadsides using improved herbicide and pesticide
application and control.
In selecting the most appropriate best management practice, careful
consideration must be given to the expected amount of runoff, the type
and amount of contaminants, the availability of land, and the physical
characteristics of the site. Some best management practices can operate
in any weather conditions, while others cannot. Where there is limited
space, certain of the structural practices may not be reasonable or
feasible, while the non-structural practices can be implemented
effectively anywhere.
FHWA encourages all states to study the quality of the highway
runoff and its properties before implementing or designing any control
treatment strategies for a specific area. Given that every watershed is
different, a one-size fits all approach could result in spending funds
for unnecessary or inappropriate treatment. We encourage early study by
providing funding for mitigation of impacts associated with federal-aid
highway projects, including stormwater control, technical assistance,
training, and research assistance to State and local transportation
staff.
See the Attachment to this statement for a status report on
research, training, and publications related to stormwater runoff,
being carried out, funded, or supported by FHWA.
Obstacles to Implementation of Environmentally-Sensitive Technologies
The permitting program under the Clean Water Act, regulating
discharges to waters of the United States, addresses stormwater
discharges associated with urban areas and certain industrial
activities, and includes transportation facilities. Because of a lack
of monitoring information, scientific analysis, and third-party
evaluations, it may be difficult for new and innovative technologies to
demonstrate significant water quality treatment to satisfy regulatory
agencies. For example, the EPA's Environmental Technology Verification
Program approves innovative treatment technologies through performance
verification and dissemination of information. Some State regulatory
agencies have similar programs. While these programs are beginning to
test and approve innovative technologies in their region, many
technologies are still being tested, thus the level of acceptance by
the regulatory agency for meeting permitting requirements may be
limited, even if the technology theoretically demonstrates the
necessary ability to meet the requirements.
Lack of a sound track record regarding the costs versus the
benefits of a particular technology also can be a problem. The business
case has to be made for why a new technology is promising for both the
environment and transportation. Life cycle information from existing
infrastructure construction will help inform future decisions.
Of course safety and engineering considerations must always be
balanced with environmental benefits. However, safety and
environmentally sensitive technologies can be compatible. Context
Sensitive Solutions that fully integrate safety into the project
development process ensure that both the environment and highway safety
benefit. For example, properly designed landscaping can ensure adequate
sight distances for drivers, avoid deadly fixed object hazards, and
maintain the ability of drivers and pedestrians to see each other.
Water quality and highway safety can both be improved with gently
sloping clear zones that allow errant motorists to regain control of
their vehicles and reduce the risk of fixed-object crashes. These clear
zones also allow highway runoff to be filtered or absorbed before
entering waterways.
Conclusion
When appropriately applied, ``green'' transportation technologies
and practices, such as use of highway infrastructure to mitigate
stormwater runoff, beneficial re-use of industrial byproduct materials,
and context sensitive solutions, not only yield significant benefits
for avoiding or mitigating negative environmental impacts of highway
construction, but can produce safety enhancements and economic savings
as well. Ongoing research, transfer of technologies and best practices,
and new partnerships are providing states and tribal governments more
knowledge and tools to address such issues as stormwater runoff
control. A heightened focus on integrated planning should help ensure
that potential environmental impacts are identified and addressed early
in the project development process.
Mr. Chairman, Members, thank you for this opportunity to testify. I
will be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
ATTACHMENT
Status of Current FHWA Water Quality Research
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/natural.htm
5/10/2007
I. Research Projects
Project: International Stormwater BMP Database
Contractor: Wright Water Engineers, Inc., and GeoSyntec Consultants
Purpose of Work: Water Environment Research Foundation, American
Society of Civil Engineers-Environmental and Water Resources Institute,
United States Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Highway
Administration and American Public Works Association have formed a
coalition of organizations to fund and manage the International
Stormwater Best Management Practices (BMP) Database. The work will
consist of entering currently available and newly developed data sets,
keeping the web site and database up to date, providing data analysis
and developing protocols for integrating low impact development
techniques into the database.
Status: The work is ongoing and the database is currently accessible
through the web site at http://www.bmpdatabase.org.
Project: Evaluation and Update of FHWA Pollutant Loadings Model for
Highway Stormwater Runoff
Contractor: U.S. Geological Survey, Reston, Virginia
Purpose of Work: The Federal Highway Administration and the U.S.
Geological Survey are cooperating on a national project to evaluate the
existing highway stormwater runoff model and update the model using new
information and software. This work will incorporate the existing model
in a new software platform, provide information on the probability
distributions of: precipitation characteristics, highway-runoff-
volumes, highway-runoff concentrations, upstream flow, upstream
receiving-water concentrations, and structural best management practice
performance. This information will be used to estimate the probability
of concentration and loads in receiving waters downstream of the
highway outfall and it will estimate the probability of the outfall
exceeding water quality standards.
Status: The model is in preparation. Information on this project can be
found at: http://ma.water.usgs.gov/fhwa/, along with the 1990 FHWA
Pollutant Loadings Model for Highway Stormwater Runoff.
Project: State Transportation Agency Strategies to Address NPDES Phase
II Requirements, NCHRP 25-25(16)
Contractor: Venner Consulting, GeoSyntec, and Parsons Brinckerhoff
Purpose of Work: The research will focus on determining how State
transportation agencies have addressed compliance with National
Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Phase II requirements.
Research will be directed toward determining staffing and
organizational structure throughout the entire agency to address NPDES
Phase II compliance for construction activities as well as the
stormwater management program as a regulated Municipal Separate Storm
Sewer System (MS4).
Status: The final draft report was submitted in November 2006 and the
consultant is addressing comments from the review panel. The final
report should be published soon.
Project: Water Quality Analyses for NEPA Documents: Selecting
Appropriate Methodologies, NCHRP 25-25(35)
Contractor: Parsons, Brinckerhoff, Quade & Douglas, Inc.
Purpose of Work: The National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA)
requires that sponsors of transportation projects consider the impacts
of those projects on water quality and water resources. There are
numerous methodologies available to perform these analyses; however,
there is little or no guidance on selecting the most effective
analytical tool for the particular information being presented for NEPA
documentation. Some methods developed by the EPA and FHWA may be more
suited for detailed project level analysis and some better suited for
planning level studies and watershed-based analyses. The objective of
this study is to identify those water quality analysis methodologies
that are best suited for detailed project-level impact assessment for
NEPA documents.
Status: The research started in December 2006, and will be concluded in
the fall of 2007.
Project: Quantifying the Components of Impervious Surfaces
Contractor: U.S. Geological Survey
Purpose of Work: The purpose of this research is to determine, using
existing land use, land cover, and impervious surface data, the
individual contribution of the various components to impervious
surfaces, to the overall storm water runoff issue. Preliminary results
of this report for six case studies (Washington, Virginia, Nebraska,
Iowa, Florida) shows that the percentage of impervious cover
contributions from road surfaces in these studies varied between 20-35
percent. Generally roads were at 28 percent, buildings at 29 percent,
and parking lots at 25 percent for total impervious areas in a
watershed. As the watershed becomes more developed and the impervious
surfaces increase, the contribution from the road surfaces decreases.
Status: Final report can be found on the web at: http://pubs.usgs.gov/
of/2007/1008/.
Project: Guidelines for the Selection of Snow and Ice Control
Materials to Mitigate Environmental Impacts, NCHRP Project 6-16
Contractor: Levelton Consultants, Ltd.
Purpose of Work: Every year considerable quantities of snow and ice
control products are applied to highways. This application involves a
balancing act of maintaining safety and applying what is needed without
causing environmental impacts. This project is looking at a way to
define the selection of winter maintenance materials based on their
environmental impact. They will be looking at the most common chemical
alternatives such as sodium chloride, magnesium chloride, calcium
chloride, calcium magnesium acetate, potassium acetate, etc. This
project will develop guidelines for selection of snow and ice control
chemicals and abrasives, based on their constituents, performance,
environmental impacts, cost, and site-specific conditions.
Investigators will look at the environmental impacts of the effects on
human health, aquatic life, flora and fauna, surface-water and
groundwater quality, air quality, vehicles, and physical infrastructure
including bridges, pavements, railway electronic signaling systems, and
power distribution lines. In the past, transportation departments have
focused on performance and cost under various weather conditions
without evaluating their relative impacts on the environment.
Status: The final report is available upon request from NCHPR.
II. State Planning and Research Funds
The Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity
Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU) requires that states set aside two
percent of the apportionments they receive from the Interstate
Maintenance, National Highway System, Surface Transportation, Highway
Safety Improvement, Highway Bridge, Congestion Mitigation and Air
Quality Improvement, and Equity Bonus programs for State planning and
research activities. Of this amount, states must allocate 25 percent
for research, development, and technology (RD&T), unless the state
certifies and the Secretary accepts the certification, that
transportation planning expenditures will require more than 75 percent
of the earmarked amount. These activities involve research on new areas
of knowledge; adapting findings to practical applications by developing
new technologies; and the transfer of these technologies, including the
process of dissemination, demonstration, training, and adoption of
innovations by users.
The State Planning and Research (SP&R) Program is intended to
address problems identified by the states. State Departments of
Transportation are encouraged to develop, establish, and implement RD&T
programs that anticipate and address transportation concerns before
they become critical problems. Each state must develop, establish, and
implement a program that ensures effective use of available SP&R funds
for RD&T activities on a statewide basis, and each state is permitted
to tailor its RD&T program to meet local needs. High priority is given
to applied research on State or regional problems, transfer of
technology from researcher to user, and research for setting standards
and specifications. Major RD&T areas include infrastructure renewal
(including pavement, structures, and asset management); activities
relating to safety, operations, and management; environmental and real
estate planning; and policy analysis and systems monitoring.
III. Available Reports and Publications:
Evaluation of Best Management Practices for Highway Runoff Control,
2006, NCHRP Report 565, Project 25-20(1)
This report focuses on improving the scientific and technical
knowledge base for the selection of best management practices (BMP)
through a better understanding of BMP performance and application. This
report documents an extensive program of research on the
characterization of BMPs and stormwater, and the influence of factors
such as land use practice, hydraulic characteristics, regional factors,
and performance evaluation. In addition to the report, a CD is affixed
to the back cover containing three additional volumes and a spreadsheet
model. The additional volumes are: User's Guide for BMP/LID Selection,
Appendices to the User's Guide, and Low Impact Development Design
Manual for Highway Runoff Control.
Great Lakes Initiative--Stormwater Workshop Report
The Great Lakes Regional Collaboration was initiated by Executive
Order (EO) 13340, issued in May 2004. This EO acknowledged the national
significance of the Great Lakes and created a unique partnership of key
members from Federal, State, and local governments, tribes and others
for the purpose of developing a strategic plan to restore and protect
the Great Lakes ecosystem. EO 13340 set up a Federal Interagency Task
Force and a Regional Working Group. On December 12, 2005, the Great
Lakes Interagency Task Force met to reinforce and demonstrate
commitment and collaborative efforts to promote further work and
progress in the Great Lakes area. The task force identified existing
federal programs that will support Great Lakes ecosystem restoration
and developed a list of action items. From this meeting in December,
the Federal Highway Administration committed to convene a gathering of
Great Lakes State DOTs to collaborate, share information, build
contacts, examine issues, and develop strategies for dealing with
stormwater runoff in the Great Lakes region. The workshop was held in
August 2006 and report was issued on the results of this workshop. Copy
of the report can be requested by calling 202-366-4085.
Eco-Logical (2006)
Eco-Logical is a guide or process for a comprehensive management
approach that federal, State, and local partners can use to get
involved in infrastructure, planning, design, review, and the
construction of projects to work more efficiently and effectively
together. The process integrates infrastructure development with
ecosystem management to advance project approvals with conservation and
sustainable land development practices. The guide is available on-line
at: http://environment.fhwa.dot.gov/ecological/ecological.pdf.
Environmental Stewardship Practices, Policies, and Procedures for Road
Construction and Maintenance (2005)
This report developed a compendium of environmental stewardship
practices, policies, and procedures in areas of construction and
maintenance. This manual can be downloaded at: http://
www.environment.transportation.org/center/
products centsprograms/environmental--stewardship.aspx.
Common Native Roadside Wildflowers (2005)
This field guide highlights 100 native forbs and grasses commonly
found on highway rights-of-way in Western America. All are native to
the United States and do not include plants that have been naturalized.
The Nature of Roadsides and the Tools to Work with It--2003
This publication discusses the various tools available for right-
of-way managers. Highway corridors crisscross our nation and the
management of these acres of land is complicated by many uses: recovery
zone for errant vehicles, utility lines, snow storage, open space,
wetland mitigation, wildlife corridors, greenways, signage, and
biodiversity. This publication discusses some of the methods and tools
available to protect and manage the beauty and value of our roadside
biota.
The National Highway Runoff Data and Methodology Synthesis--2003
Volume I: Technical Issues for Monitoring Highway Runoff and Urban
Stormwater
Volume II: Project Documentation with CD based bibliographic database
of reports
Volume III: Availability and Documentation of Published Information for
Synthesis of Regional or National Highway Runoff Quality Data
This report evaluates the existing highway runoff quality data to
determine if the quality and processes contributing to water quality
constituents in highway runoff can be adequately characterized on a
nationwide basis to fulfill the information needs of highway
practitioners. Results are also available through the internet at:
http://ma.water.usgs.gov/FHWA/.
Common Roadside Wildflowers (2003)
This field guide highlights 100 native forbs and grasses commonly
found on highway rights-of-way and other natural areas across Eastern
America. State Departments of Transportation are encouraging their use
for many reasons: their natural beauty, adaptation to arid
environments, usefulness to wildlife, addition to biodiversity and land
health, ability to slow water runoff, and slope stabilization.
Aquatic Ecology and Stream Restoration Video--Fall 2003
This video showcases six stream restoration case studies from
across the Nation and promotes the importance of restoring our streams
after road construction. This project documents examples of a
nationwide effort on stream restoration showing the appropriate designs
and techniques for stream relocation, fish and wildlife habitat
preservation, and methods to improve the water quality while providing
safe, efficient roadways. The series of videos has been developed by
North Carolina Department of Transportation for Federal Highway
Administration and is now available and a copy can be obtained by
calling 202-366-2054.
Keeping It Simple--Easy Ways to Help Wildlife Along Roads (2003)
This brochure highlights more than 100 simple, successful
activities that help make roads more wildlife friendly, from all 50
states. These success stories are also available at our web site:
www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/wildlifeprotection. The web site allows
users to search by State and by category, and it provides contact
information for sending new ``keeping it simple'' success stories to be
added to the site.
Assessing the Impacts of Bridge Deck Runoff Contaminants in Receiving
Waters--2002, NCHRP Report 474, Volume 1: Final Report, Volume 2:
Practitioner's Handbook
This report presents guidance for assessing and, if necessary,
mitigating the impacts of bridge deck runoff. The final report includes
findings of the literature review and a survey of highway agency
practices, consultation and testing of sites. The second volume or
practitioner's handbook presents the assessment process as a result of
the final report.
Wet Detention Pond Design for Highway Runoff Pollution Control
The research developed a methodology for designing efficient wet
detention ponds in the highway environment. The methodology included
performance characteristics, design guidelines, conditions,
limitations, and applications for use. A comparison was made between
wet detention ponds and dry detention ponds in order to show the
advantages and disadvantages of each system. The research is complete
and the preliminary draft final report was submitted to the technical
oversight panel for review. The unedited final report for NCHRP Project
25-12 as prepared by the University of Washington is available for loan
by contacting NCHRP at [email protected].
Common Roadside Invasives (2002)
This laminated field guide identifies common and showy roadside
invasive grasses and forbs, all of which are on various State noxious
weed lists. We provide this guide with the expectation that it will
help roadside vegetation managers and maintenance personnel to identify
and control invasive plants in their jurisdictions.
Wildlife Habitat Connectivity Across European Highways--August 2002
The Federal Highway Administration, American Association of State
Highway and Transportation Officials, and the National Cooperative
Highway Research Program sponsored an international technology scan to
learn what actions are being taken in Europe to address habitat and
wildlife issues. As a result of the trip, the team formed conclusions
and recommendations for U.S. application in the areas of policy,
communication, guidance manuals, and research. This publication is
available from our Office of International Programs.
Management of Runoff from Surface Transportation Facilities--Synthesis
and Research Plan, 2001, NCHRP Web Document 37
The final report has been posted at: http://onlinepubs.trb.org/
onlinepubs/nchrp/nchrp-w37.pdf. The objectives of this
research on the management of the quality and quantity of runoff waters
from surface transportation facilities, was to (1) synthesize existing
knowledge and practice into a form usable by practitioners; (2) develop
a strategic research plan to address gaps in existing knowledge; and
(3) recommend a system for continued exchange of information between
practitioners and others interested in water-quality and runoff issues.
Guidance Manual for Monitoring Highway Runoff Water Quality--June 2001
The Federal Highway Administration contracted with URS Group, Inc.,
to conduct an evaluation of water quality monitoring equipment for
measuring the constituents of highway stormwater runoff. Testing was
done on the methodologies and use of these various monitoring and
sampling equipment in the highway environment. The results are
presented in this manual. This manual will assist State and local
governments prepare highway stormwater monitoring programs based on
monitoring goals. Guidance is provided to assist the user in not only
selecting equipment, but also with highway stormwater runoff monitoring
designs for a comprehensive plan. Recommendations and field evaluations
are given for specific equipment and monitoring methods. The report
provides recommendations on adaptations necessary for using available
off-the-shelf equipment to improve the evaluation of stormwater runoff
in the highway setting.
Wetlands Data Reporting System--Spring 2001
The FHWA has developed the Wetlands Accounting Database for
collecting and analyzing wetland mitigation data. The database is
designed to accumulate data about wetlands mitigation projects. It
collects, correlates, and presents this data as useful and meaningful
information. The CD-based software is available upon request.
Case Histories of Wetland Restoration--December 2000
This report highlights four wetland restoration projects from
regionally different areas within the United States. These studies show
that restoration can result in highly successful ecological communities
that are similar in structure and function to the natural ones. The
goals, objectives, and criteria for restoration should be established
in relation to the water regime of the drainage basin and ecosystem in
which they lie. The four projects in this publication offer some
insight into what elements lead to a successful restoration project.
There is no single path, but certain elements and themes emerge from
the examination of these projects.
Environmental Impact of Construction and Repair Materials on Surface
and Ground Waters--NCHRP 25-9--June 2000
The CD-ROM based report presents a validated methodology for
assessing the environmental impact of highway construction and repair
materials on surface and ground water under six general highway
reference environments. This methodology includes: (1) a set of
comprehensive bioassay protocols that directly measure the toxicity of
leachates from highway construction and repair materials on two target
organisms, the water flea, Daphnia magna, and the freshwater algae,
Selenastrum capricornutum, and (2) the IMPACT model that can estimate
the fate and transport of such leachates in typical highway
environments. The IMPACT model is based on an extensive database of
bioassay toxicity results for materials ranging from common
construction and repair products to waste and recycled materials
proposed for use in highway construction.
Stormwater Management Practices in an Ultra-Urban Setting: Selection
and Monitoring--May 2000
This report focuses on design criteria and monitoring studies on
stormwater best management practices (BMPs) implemented in ultra-urban
settings. The report provides planning level review of the
applicability and use of new and more traditional BMPs in ultra-urban
areas. The report provides specific guidance for selecting and siting
stormwater management technologies. Case studies are used to highlight
various examples throughout the country that address ultra-urban
considerations.
Critter Crossings--Linking Habitats and Reducing Roadkill--February
2000
This brochure describes the transportation impacts on wildlife and
highlights projects and processes that help to reduce these impacts.
Roadside Use of Native Plants--September 1999
This publication is for use in making site specific decisions. The
primer provides a holistic background information for decision-making.
It addresses basic techniques for using native plants. The State-by-
State section pulls together native, endangered, and noxious plant
lists to aid in design and management. The manual includes definitions,
bibliographies, and policy citations to clarify the use of native
plants on roadsides.
Evaluation and Management of Highway Runoff Water Quality--June 1996
This manual synthesizes the results of past documentation and
research on highway stormwater runoff into a single-volume user's
manual on water quality impact assessment and mitigation. It presents
available and appropriate impact prediction and mitigation tools for
use during highway project planning and development activities.
IV. Training Courses, Workshops, and Award Programs
Design and Implementation of Erosion and Sediment Control--NHI Course
#142054
This NHI course was developed as a joint effort between FHWA and
the EPA Office of Water. The course reflects the Agencies' commitment
to providing education and training on planning, design,
implementation, enforcement, inspection, and maintenance strategies to
control erosion and sediment on highway construction projects, as well
as to ensure that regulatory issues are addressed accurately and
uniformly. Each discipline involved in a highway construction project
has a different set of priorities. The course offers participants
opportunities for discussion and joint problem-solving, through which
they will gain information about the roles and responsibilities of
other team members.
Water Quality Management of Highway Runoff--NHI Course #142047
This NHI course, developed with EPA Office of Water, provides an
overview of the basic water quality parameters and processes, along
with the requirements and guidance on best management practices the
transportation community can use in mitigating highway runoff impacts
and protecting water quality. This course shares approaches and
technologies for the water quality management of highway runoff,
including the effective maintenance, inspection and evaluation of Best
Management Practices (BMPs).
Managing Road Impacts on Stream Ecosystems: An Interdisciplinary
Approach--NHI Course #142048
This NHI course will introduce and discuss the basic concepts
related to the impacts that roadways have on streams and stream
ecosystems. The course will be structured to first address the
ecological and physical characteristics of stream ecosystems, discuss
the impacts that roadways can have on those ecosystems, and then look
at tools that the practitioner can use to help avoid and mitigate those
effects. Through the use of case studies, discussion, and other
techniques, the participants will be afforded an opportunity to use
critical thinking to identify solutions and preventative measures
related to the impacts of roads on streams and their riparian
communities. The course will be available at the end of the fiscal year
2007.
International Conference on Ecology and Transportation--May 20-25, 2007
in Little Rock, Arkansas
Multi-disciplinary, interagency event conducted biennially to
identify and share quality research applications and best management
practices that address wildlife, habitat, and ecosystem issues related
to the delivery of surface transportation systems.
2007 Environmental Excellence Awards
These awards have been designed to recognize outstanding
transportation projects, processes, and people who incorporate
environmental stewardship into the planning and project development
processes using FHWA funding sources. The winners will be recognized at
our International Conference on Ecology and Transportation in Little
Rock, Arkansas on May 20-25, 2007.
Exemplary Ecosystem Initiatives (EEI)
Since 2002, FHWA has designated 43 Exemplary Ecosystem Initiatives
in 31 States. An EEI is an initiative that sustains or restores natural
systems and their functions and values. EEIs are developed within a
landscape context, using partnering and collaborative approaches and
the best available science in ecosystem and habitat conservation. All
EEIs are posted on FHWA's web site at: http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/
environment/ecosystems/index.htm.
Alternative Practices for Highway Stormwater Management (2006)
This previously aired four-part webcast series, which can be
accessed on the Web at any time, was presented by the Izaak Walton
League and sponsored by FHWA. The sessions outline the latest
techniques available to help transportation agencies save money, comply
with water quality and water supply regulations, and improve water
quality with context-sensitive stormwater management practices,
including low impact development techniques. These techniques also can
help highway department personnel manage stormwater quantity and
quality while using existing rights of way and providing easy access
for maintenance crews. Each session includes valuable background
information and specific guidance on how to apply these principles for
highway projects. The series also addresses barriers to using
innovative stormwater management techniques and how to overcome those
barriers. This series provides valuable information to design
engineers, planners, regulators, students, maintenance supervisors,
construction engineers, and consultants. To view the archived Webcast,
go to: http://itre.ncsu.edu/cte/TechTransfer/Teleconferences/
iwla2006.asp.
Environmental Factors of Construction and Maintenance (Under
Development)
FHWA is developing a training course on how to mitigate
environmental impacts during construction and maintenance projects. The
course is intended to familiarize State and contractor construction
personnel with environmental concerns that should be addressed as part
of construction operations. These concerns include construction noise,
construction dust, light pollution from nighttime operations,
vibration, alkali runoff from concrete pour/sawcut, emissions from
equipment exhaust, disruption of species habitat or migration/ESA
commitments, damage to archaeological or cultural resources, Stormwater
Pollution Prevention Plan (SWPPP)-maintenance activities, and hazardous
materials. We expect the course to be available sometime next year.
Biography for Gloria M. Shepherd
Gloria M. Shepherd is the Associate Administrator for Planning,
Environment and Realty, U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal
Highway Administration (FHWA). She previously held the position as
Director of Planning for the FHWA. She joined FHWA in 1999 having
served previously as the Staff Director for the Transportation
Solutions Group, Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) and the
Deputy Director of the Office of Planning and Preliminary Engineering
Maryland State Highway Administration, MDOT. She was previously Chief
of Staff for the Commissioner of the New York State's Department of
Transportation (NYS DOT).
She earned her Masters of Law degree from Georgetown University,
Doctor of Jurisprudence degree from Albany Law School, and her Doctor
of Arts from the University at Albany (SUNY).
Chairman Wu. Thank you very much, Ms. Shepherd. Mr.
Grumbles, welcome to the Committee.
STATEMENT OF MR. BENJAMIN H. GRUMBLES, ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR
FOR WATER, U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
Mr. Grumbles. Thank you very much Mr. Chairman, Congressman
Gingrey, Congressman Ehlers, Congressman Baird. It is great to
be back before this committee.
It is an honor and it is an even greater opportunity to
discuss and to promote green infrastructure, for transportation
and for healthier watersheds, as the wave of the future for
this country as we look at the water and the transportation
challenges.
I, too, will be brief and summarize my testimony, but the
major point here is that the U.S. EPA, in collaboration with
other agencies, such as the Federal Highways and also
governmental and nongovernmental partners, are advancing this
concept of green infrastructure like never before, because we
see, through technology, innovation, and collaboration, it is a
sustainable way forward to also accelerate environmental
progress.
This is a very important part of our four pillars of
sustainability. When it comes to infrastructure, and that
pillar of a watershed approach, the Administrator's objective
is to change the way America views and values infrastructure.
The objective is to not ``just'' emphasize the critical
importance of it but also find environmentally sensitive
approaches. That is why we are so excited about green
infrastructure. And in the transportation arena in particular,
we are very enthused about the Green Highways Partnership. EPA
Region 3 and the Federal Highways and many partners have been
involved over the past couple years in an innovative
collaboration. In this collaboration we pursue technologies;
porous pavements and concrete; practical and protective
wetlands strategies; and ways to address one of the fundamental
challenges and concerns to watersheds across the country, and
that is stormwater runoff, stormwater contamination. So, we are
very enthused about green highways and green infrastructure
transportation methods.
I want to just emphasize that for us, as you pointed out in
your statement, the term itself is not a rigid definition. For
us, green infrastructure is systems or practices that use or
mimic natural processes to focus on vegetation, infiltration,
evapotranspiration, reclamation, and re-use of excess
stormwater.
In this watershed, where we are right now in the Capitol,
in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, we know that over the last ten
years, population has increased seven percent, and the amount
of impervious surface has increased 41 percent. We know that
has adverse environmental impacts. We are committed to working
together with you and other committees, with colleagues outside
of government, and with agencies to advance green
infrastructure concepts.
What I want to mention as well is that the Agency has
entered into some significant memoranda and agreements. One of
them, on April 9, the Administrator of EPA entered into an
agreement with the Natural Resources Defense Council, the
National Association of Clean Water Agencies, the Low Impact
Development Center, and also, the Association of State and
Interstate Water Pollution Control Administrators to advance
green infrastructure concepts, to use rain gardens and green
roofs, to protect wetlands, to come up with innovative
approaches and different types of concrete that help reduce
concerns about stormwater pollution. And we are committed to
following through on that important effort.
I too have also signaled to the various EPA Regions that
green infrastructure is a priority for the National Water
Program, and so, we are going to be taking advantage of your
leadership in having this hearing and moving forward with
approaches, ways to reduce barriers. Sometimes the barriers may
be due to local regulation. Sometimes it is just due to people
not understanding that they can have healthier watersheds and
transportation systems by using these innovative technologies.
One thing I did also want to point out, that a very
important effort that has been critical to EPA's interests in
and approach on working with others on green infrastructure is
the NRDC rooftops to rivers report. One of the greatest
challenges in this country, in addition to stormwater runoff
from transportation systems, is sewer overflows and stormwater
pollution. And so, this report provides green strategies for
controlling stormwater and combined sewer overflows, and it
identifies various areas in the country, including Portland,
Oregon and other cities, that are showing leadership.
So, Mr. Chairman, I look forward to answering questions
that you and your colleagues have and to working with you to
promote green infrastructure transportation and healthier
watersheds across the country.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Grumbles follows:]
Prepared Statement of Benjamin H. Grumbles
I. Introduction
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, I am Benjamin
Grumbles, Assistant Administrator for Water at the United States
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Thank you for inviting me to
discuss EPA's programs and initiatives on green infrastructure, clean
water, and healthy watersheds. I believe that there are many
opportunities for green infrastructure practices to be applied to
protect water quality and enhance our communities. States and thousands
of communities and transportation agencies across the Nation face
difficult challenges in meeting stormwater and sewer overflow
regulatory requirements. Green infrastructure provides tools for these
communities to meet regulatory requirements and non-regulatory needs in
the context of broader community goals. EPA believes green
infrastructure has great potential to advance environmental protection
and economic prosperity through technology, innovation, and
collaboration.
II. What Is Green Infrastructure, and How Does It Help Protect Water
Quality?
``Green Infrastructure'' is a relatively new and flexible term, and
it has been used by various speakers and writers in various contexts.
Thus, to date, there is no universally established definition of the
term. In addition, several other terms are often used interchangeably
with, or as aspects of, ``green infrastructure,'' such as ``low impact
development (LID)'' and ``conservation development.'' In my remarks
today, as well as in my March 5, 2007, memorandum [see Attachment A]
entitled, ``Using Green Infrastructure to Protect Water Quality in
Stormwater, CSO, Nonpoint Source and other Water Programs,'' I have
intended the term ``green infrastructure'' to generally refer to
systems and practices that use or mimic natural processes to
infiltrate, evapotranspirate (the return of water to the atmosphere
either through evaporation or by plants), or re-use stormwater on the
site where it is generated.
Green infrastructure encompasses a large set of specific practices.
Typical techniques include literally green practices such as green
roofs, rain gardens, and bio-swales. However, the term is also often
used to include other technologies, such as permeable concrete or rain
barrels, that similarly promote the onsite infiltration,
evapotranspiration, or re-use of stormwater. At EPA, we promote all
such onsite practices and technologies under the green infrastructure
umbrella.
Green infrastructure practices protect water quality primarily in
two ways. First, they reduce the amount of pollutants that run off a
site and ultimately are discharged into adjacent waterbodies. Second,
they reduce or eliminate the water that runs off the site. Traditional
development practices cover large areas of the ground with impervious
surfaces such as roads, driveways, and buildings. The Center for
Watershed Protection (``CWP'') has classified our nation's development
patterns as ``habitat for cars, habitat for people, and habitat for
nature.'' Once such development occurs, rainwater cannot infiltrate
into the ground, but rather runs offsite at levels that are much higher
than would naturally occur. The collective force of all such rainwater
scours streams, erodes stream banks, and thereby causes large
quantities of sediment and other entrained pollutants to enter the
waterbody each time it rains. Green infrastructure techniques are
designed to reduce such runoff through infiltration, evapo-
transpiration and re-use, thereby helping to protect the receiving
streams as well as replenish ground-water supplies.
EPA believes that green infrastructure approaches and practices can
be a significant component of states' and cities' programs to reduce
and control stormwater, combined sewer overflows, and nonpoint source
pollution. They can be used by communities to help meet requirements of
their stormwater permits under the National Pollutant Discharge
Elimination System (``NPDES'') permit program under the Clean Water
Act, and similarly can play a significant role in the creation and
implementation of long-term control plans (``LTCP'') to reduce combined
sewer overflows. Moreover, green infrastructure can play a critical
role in the broader context of sustainable infrastructure by being
integrated into comprehensive plans that simultaneously address
communities' drinking water supply, wastewater management, stormwater
management and recreational needs. The use of green infrastructure can
help communities meet their overall water resource management goals and
reduce the costs (or free up funding for other uses such as land
purchases) of constructing and maintaining engineered infrastructure
including pipes and treatment systems.
There are many green technologies that can help protect water
quality, and no single set of practices can be identified as the best
for all circumstances; approaches should be tailored to fit local
circumstances. For example, in a very heavily developed downtown area,
where space is at a premium, the placement of green roofs on the top of
office buildings and residential high rises may be the most economical
way to retain stormwater on site. A recent study of green roofs in
Portland, Oregon demonstrated that, over a period of 18 months which
included the wettest month on record, five different configurations of
green roof types and thickness reduced the volume of runoff leaving the
site 65 to 94 percent. On the other hand, in a suburban setting
characterized by many single-family homes, rain gardens might provide a
more cost-effective means to obtain similar results. Similarly, the
problems presented and the solutions to be prescribed will differ
greatly between Washington, D.C., and the arid Southwest. Thus the
determination of the most appropriate technologies will depend on a
number of site-specific factors, such as available space, soil
characteristics, depth of the water table, and climatic factors.
III. To What Extent Are States and Communities Already Implementing
Green Infrastructure Projects?
In the 1990's, several communities and nonprofit groups began
promoting and demonstrating the effectiveness of green infrastructure
techniques. In 2000, Prince George's County, MD, authored, and EPA
published, two companion books, ``LID Design Strategies'' and ``LID
Hydrologic Analysis,'' which provided detailed guidance for local
communities to install rain gardens and other LID techniques to reduce
and control stormwater runoff. Since that time, throughout the country,
numerous additional documents have been published, conferences and
technical seminars held, and local ordinances modified or enacted, that
promote the incorporation of green infrastructure into development
practices. See, e.g., www.epa.gov/nps/lid.
A number of cities across the Nation are already investing heavily
in green infrastructure in order to manage their stormwater and/or
abate their combined sewer overflows. The list includes large cities
such as Portland (OR), Seattle (WA), Chicago (IL), and Philadelphia
(PA), and smaller jurisdictions such as Lexana (KS), Prince George's
County (MD), Griffith (GA), Emoryville (CA), Warsaw and Stafford
Counties (VA), and Huntersville (NC). This list is growing as I speak,
with recent announcements, proposed and final ordinances, and policy
changes having been made by the cities of Boston, Washington, D.C., and
New York City, and by states such as California and New Jersey.
Many organizations are currently working cooperatively to improve
our understanding of the costs and benefits of green infrastructure.
Nonprofit groups such as the LID Center, Center for Neighborhood
Technology, Casey Trees, CWP, and others have published studies that
estimate the costs, cost savings, and/or water quality benefits
associated with various LID technologies at particular sites. Detailed
studies and demonstration projects are being implemented by leading
universities around the country, federal agencies (e.g., the Department
of Defense has published an LID Design Manual to be used at all DOD
facilities and recently FHWA and EPA co-founded a Green Highways
Partnership grant for innovative watershed management projects within
the Anacostia Watershed) and State and local governments (e.g., through
funding provided by EPA's Nonpoint Source Program under Section 319 of
the Clean Water Act).
IV. What is EPA Doing to Promote Increased Adoption of Green
Infrastructure?
A. Partnerships to Promote Green Infrastructure
On March 7, 2007, I issued a memorandum to all of EPA's Regional
Administrators expressing my strong support for the increased
development and use of green infrastructure in water program
implementation. I listed the many benefits that green infrastructure
provides, including cleaner water, enhanced water supplies, cleaner
air, reduced urban temperatures, increased energy efficiency, community
benefits, and cost savings. On April 19, 2007, EPA Administrator
Stephen L. Johnson signed a ``Green Infrastructure Statement of
Intent'' with representatives of the National Association of Clean
Water Agencies, Natural Resources Defense Council (``NRDC''), LID
Center, and Association of State and Interstate Water Pollution Control
Administrators, that formalized a collaborative effort among the
signatory organizations to promote the benefits of using green
infrastructure in protecting drinking water supplies and public health,
mitigating overflows from combined and separate sewers and reducing
stormwater pollution, and to encourage the use of green infrastructure
by cities and wastewater treatment plants as a prominent component of
their programs. EPA will work to include green infrastructure
components and water quality trading and watershed projects. EPA is
working with these and other key groups to develop a multi-pronged
green infrastructure strategy. See www.epa.gov/npdes/
greeninfrastructure.
At the same time, EPA has partnered with numerous organizations in
a variety of other forums to promote and understand the benefits of
green infrastructure approaches and practices. We are working with non-
governmental organizations and associations such as the American
Institute of Architects to promote urban design and planning to protect
and restore water resources. We are participating in an effort led by
Ladybird Wildflower Center and the American Society of Landscape
Architects to develop sustainability metrics to aid design and planning
professionals in designing landscapes that are functional components of
our water resource infrastructure. To promote green building, we are
working with the U.S. Green Building Council, the Congress for the New
Urbanism and NRDC to incorporate metrics for onsite infiltration,
evapotranspiration and re-use into a new Leadership in Energy and
Environmental Design for Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND) rating
system. As another example, working with The Conservation Fund, EPA,
and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service has sponsored
training for diverse audiences and participated in stakeholder
processes in the development of green infrastructure plans at different
geographic scales. There are in fact many other cooperative
initiatives, such as a Source Water Collaborative and a Sustainable
Infrastructure Initiative, whereby EPA works actively with many
partners to promote green infrastructure.
EPA has also funded and partnered with leading engineering and
science organizations in the United States, and the Federal Highway
Administration (FHWA), in the development of the International
Stormwater Best Management Practices (BMP) Database. The database,
available online at www.bmpdatabase.org, provides a public platform for
sharing information on best management practices to manage stormwater,
including LID practices.
B. Overcoming Existing Barriers to Green Infrastructure
The future looks very bright for green infrastructure. However, we
will need to overcome some long-standing barriers in order to expedite
its progress. Pursuant to the April 19, 2007, agreement that
Administrator Johnson co-signed with partnering groups, EPA and its
partners have begun to work together to meet its objectives. These
include components such as:
Continuing research and development of green
infrastructure management practices performance and
effectiveness. This information is critical to increasing the
rate of implementation of green infrastructure practices.
Guidance, assistance and education on selecting and
applying green infrastructure approaches.
Regulatory guidance that provides direction to
promote utilization of green infrastructure approaches in lieu
of, or in combination with, gray infrastructure approaches.
Such guidance could be issued in the context of stormwater
permits, long-term control plans for combined sewer overflows,
enforcement documents, and funding programs.
Documentation of the multiple benefits and relative
life cycle costs of green infrastructure approaches as compared
to more traditional technologies.
Publicizing, cataloging, and recognizing successful
green infrastructure projects and approaches.
Interestingly, one of the most significant barriers to implementing
green infrastructure is local regulation. Many local ordinances,
written a generation or two ago, require wide streets, curbs, gutters
and underground storm sewers, and expansive ratios for paved parking
square footage. Others require detention ponds and in some cases
retention ponds, without giving credit for onsite practices that
infiltrate, evapotranspirate, or re-use stormwater. Useful books have
been written about such local codes and provided guidance on how to
change them. An example includes ``Better Site Design: A Handbook for
Changing Development Rules in Your Community'' (CWP, 1988, funded in
part by EPA. EPA intends to work with its partners to continue to
provide information to municipalities, counties, states, and others
that explains the many economic, social, and environmental advantages
that they can achieve by using green infrastructure alternatives in
appropriate circumstances.
C. EPA Research Efforts Related to Green Infrastructure
The EPA Water Quality Research Program includes studies on the
control of stormwater pollution, including the use of green
infrastructure processes. Research specific to the transportation
sector has included the ability of retention basins and constructed
wetlands, such as are installed as part of highway drainage systems for
flood control, to mitigate nutrients, sediment, metals, and bacteria.
EPA has also begun an evaluation of the effectiveness of swales,
commonly used as a drainage tool along roadways where transportation
right-of-ways can provide space and infiltration systems.
EPA's research program has documented and modeled the performance
of porous surfaces in controlling stormwater runoff. The research
program is now installing and evaluating porous pavement parking and a
modular block system. These projects will allow evaluation of changes
in the technology over time. Demonstrations have also been undertaken
to examine the ability of green roofs to reduce the effect of roof-top
impervious area with respect to hydrology and selected stressors. EPA
will continue to evaluate these and other low impact development
technologies in the future.
EPA plans to publish a new study within the next few months that
will examine about a dozen LID and green infrastructure projects. The
vast majority of these projects have been found to cost less money than
a more traditional hard infrastructure project would have cost. Cost
savings often result from site design techniques such as narrower
streets, smaller storm sewer pipes, and elimination or reduction of
detention basins, which can more than offset the increased costs of
adding some LID practices.
Consideration of additional factors, such as the energy savings
achieved by green roofs or the increased sales value of a home with a
rain garden and reduced imperviousness, could tip the cost-benefit
balance even more in favor of green infrastructure.
V. Green Infrastructure and Transportation
Transportation, ranging from super-highways to unpaved county
roads, constitutes a significant component of our national
infrastructure. As such, it presents similar opportunities for the
incorporation of green infrastructure techniques, such as diverting
flows onto medians and rights-of-way, where the flows may be
evapotranspirated and/or infiltrated.
EPA cooperates with federal agencies (e.g., Department of
Transportation, U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service, and
Bureau of Land Management), the National Association of County
Engineers, the National Association of Counties, the American Public
Works Association, and State and local governments to promote
environmentally sound LID designs and maintenance practices for low
volume and rural roads. Working together, we have collectively
developed a guidance manual, a website to promote environmentally sound
maintenance practices for dirt and gravel roads (http://www.ltapt2.org/
resources/ruralresources.php), and, through DOT's Local Transportation
Assistance Program (LTAP), a clearinghouse and electronic discussion
list-serve focused on environmental considerations relating to low-
volume roads. In addition, EPA staff actively participates in
Transportation Research Board (``TRB'') committees on low volume roads,
ecology and transportation, and environmental analysis in
transportation, and have worked with the Federal Highway Administration
(FHWA) to develop training courses on water quality/stormwater
management and erosion and sediment control for highway engineers and
public works staff.
An essential aspect of any green infrastructure strategy is
comprehensive planning. Watershed planning should be integrated with
transportation planning and other local and regional community planning
efforts. EPA participated on a workgroup chaired by FHWA that wrote
Eco-Logical: An Ecosystem Approach to Developing Infrastructure
Projects. Eco-Logical emphasizes integrated planning approaches. EPA
has worked with FHWA and groups such as the National Association of
Regional Councils to promote integrated planning to protect water
resources. Approaches such as Context Sensitive Solutions help
communities plan the placement and design of transportation facilities
that are safe and meet a community's transportation needs while
preserving scenic, aesthetic, historic and environmental resources.
A Transportation Model: The Green Highways Partnership
EPA is very proud to be a primary sponsor of the Green Highways
Partnership, a voluntary, public/private collaboration in the Mid-
Atlantic region with an expansive list of partners from the
environmental, transportation and industry sectors. Green Highways,
like Green Infrastructure, is not a defined term of art. However, some
characteristics of green highways are that they are:
built with permeable materials that provide superior
watershed-driven stormwater management, thus preventing metals
and toxins from leaching into streams and rivers;
constructed with recycled materials, thereby reducing
landfill usage; and
designed using cutting-edge technologies to protect
critical habitats, waterways, and ecosystems from the adverse
impacts and encroachment of highway infrastructure.
The Green Highways Partnership is demonstrating the opportunities
that exist through integration of environmental and transportation
planning, using the green infrastructure approach. Through concepts
such as regulatory flexibility and market-based rewards, Green Highways
seeks to incorporate environmental streamlining and stewardship into
all aspects of the highway lifecycle. Green Highways looks for
opportunities to design roadways using cutting-edge technologies, like
those which support green infrastructure, including LID practices, to
protect critical habitats, waterways, and ecosystems from the adverse
impacts and encroachment of highway infrastructure; build roadways with
permeable materials that provide superior watershed-driven stormwater
management, thus preventing metals and toxins from leaching into
streams and rivers; and construct roadways with recycled materials,
thereby reducing landfill usage. The outcome is sustainable
transportation infrastructure that is ``beyond compliance'' and leaves
the environment and communities ``better than before.''
While examples and practices are occurring throughout the Mid-
Atlantic region, the Partnership is actively engaged in several
demonstrations in Maryland and DC. The U.S. Highway 301 Waldorf
Transportation Improvements project is working towards becoming the
Nation's first truly green highway by incorporating the principles of
the Green Highways Partnership and green infrastructure in its earliest
planning stages.
Through Green Highways, EPA has partnered with FHWA, State
Departments of Transportation, and county planning organizations to map
the natural resources in a geographic area and conduct green
infrastructure assessments to inform and complement the comprehensive
transportation plan. For example, the U.S. 301 Project team is working
on updating the regional green infrastructure assessment to aid in
decision-making at every level of the project: location, design,
stormwater management, and mitigation. Similarly, the District of
Columbia DOT has developed its own design standards to create an
infrastructure to support the sustainable economic and environmental
health of the region and the creation of livable communities. As an
example, the District DOT has implemented a bioretention cell, which
has reduced pollutant loads by more than 90 percent.
Conclusion
We have made and are continuing to make major investments in the
implementation of programs and practices to protect and restore waters
that are impacted or may be impacted by stormwater, urban runoff, and
combined sewer overflows. Green infrastructure can be both a cost-
effective and an environmentally preferable approach to reduce
stormwater and other excess flows entering combined or separate sewer
systems in combination with, or in lieu of, centralized hard
infrastructure solutions. We will continue to work with this committee,
our federal colleagues, and the many partners, stakeholders, and
citizens who want to promote green infrastructure to achieve our water
quality goals as well as to promote more livable communities. This
concludes my prepared remarks; I would be happy to respond to any
questions you may have.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Biography for Benjamin H. Grumbles
Benjamin H. Grumbles was confirmed by the United States Senate on
November 20, 2004, as Assistant Administrator for the Office of Water
at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Prior to being appointed
Acting Assistant Administrator in December, 2003, Mr. Grumbles served
as Deputy Assistant Administrator for Water and Acting Associate
Administrator for Congressional and Intergovernmental Relations.
Before coming to EPA in 2002, Mr. Grumbles was Deputy Chief of
Staff and Environmental Counsel for the Science Committee in the U.S.
House of Representatives. For over fifteen years, he served in various
capacities on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee
staff, including Senior Counsel for the Water Resources and Environment
Subcommittee, and focused on programs and activities of the EPA and the
Army Corps of Engineers.
From 1993 to 2004, he was an adjunct Professor of Law at the George
Washington University Law School, teaching a course on the Clean Water
Act, Safe Drinking Water Act, Ocean Dumping Act, and Oil Pollution Act.
His degrees include a B.A., Wake Forest University; J.D., Emory
University; and LL.M. in Environmental Law, from the George Washington
University Law School.
Ben was born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky. He currently lives
in Arlington, Virginia, with his wife, Karen, and two children.
Discussion
Chairman Wu. Thank you very much, Mr. Grumbles.
We have just been notified of a series of, a long series of
votes, and I understand that one or more of the government
witnesses may have to leave at 3:30, so I am going to seek
unanimous consent to ask the first two witnesses questions. And
hearing no objections, so ordered. Mr. Grumbles, I am going to
confine myself to one or two questions, and then turn it over
to my colleague, Dr. Gingrey.
I very much appreciate your memorandum written this March,
supporting green streets and green efforts, and I want to ask
you what other guidance can or does EPA Office of Water provide
to its Regions, to communities interested in green
transportation infrastructure development, and how does your
Office collaborate with regional EPA offices?
Mr. Grumbles. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The National Water Program is excited about a couple
opportunities in particular, one is what we are learning in the
Mid-Atlantic on the Green Highways Program, this unique
collaboration with Federal Highways and with other State and
local government and private sector entities. We are looking to
share with other EPA Regions through guidance or different
materials. We are also very focused on working with our
Enforcement and Compliance Assistance Office, as they look at
communities that have sewer overflow challenges, or stormwater
problems, and looking for opportunities to incorporate various
practices that reflect a green infrastructure approach.
It is also very important to the National Water Program
that it becomes an important component of our overall strategy
on wetlands protection that gaining, not simply maintaining,
wetlands in the United States is a critically important part of
the infrastructure. And then, of course, as this committee
knows and has focused on, the importance of technology and
continuing to evaluate different technologies and approaches.
It is important to us to work with our Research Office and with
the private sector and other agencies to advance the science
and improve the environmental results of so many of these
exciting green infrastructure transportation technologies.
Chairman Wu. Well, Mr. Grumbles, if there is anything that
this Congress, this committee, or this subcommittee can do to
assist you in a more uniform acceptance of a green streets
approach across the Regions, we would be delighted to do that.
And with that, I would like to turn over time to my
colleague, Dr. Gingrey, from Georgia.
Mr. Gingrey. Mr. Chairman, thank you, and in the interests
of Mr. Grumbles' time, in particular, and also, I will ask Ms.
Shepherd a question, and then, hopefully, we will get to hear
from the other witnesses and question them as well.
My staff was briefing me on the hearing earlier today, and
were telling me about some of the technologies and things that
could be done. I have said well, gee, you know, I don't think
that will work. And it was, Mr. Grumbles, in regard to the
issue of regular maintenance of things like porous pavement,
and taking care of the vegetation in the bioswales, you know.
And so, my question is, because I am concerned, and then,
there is a recurring criticism of some of the green
transportation practices, is the need for this regular
maintenance, and I mentioned the vacuuming of porous pavement,
or attending to the vegetation in the bio-swales. When you are
reviewing technologies like this for potential inclusion into
the best management practices, are O&M estimated by the EPA?
Do you look at these things and say, well, what will it
cost to maintain it, and in fact, even if it is put in place,
will the cooperation be there? I mean, if you have got to
vacuum concrete once every couple of years, or dig out and
replant the vegetation every five years, are State and local
folks going to do that, and what is the cost to comply?
Mr. Grumbles. Your question is just right on target, about
what are the practical aspects and ramifications of some of
these emerging technologies, and I would just say a couple
things.
One, EPA is focused on environmental results more than on
particular technologies, and we don't, through our ETV program,
certify particular technologies. We do evaluate them, and our
goal is to get out the best information on various technologies
and work with others and work at the grassroots level to give
them the information, so that they can choose which
technologies are the most effective and practical.
And you are exactly right that as communities, and as EPA,
look at the range of options, because there is no one size fits
all, it depends on the local circumstances and climate and
geographic factors and community needs. It is important to give
the biggest possible list and options and then provide
information. You are right. Sometimes, as we move towards
greater vegetated green approaches in some areas it may not be
as practical given the terrain or the climate. But some of the
experts who are on the panel, who have real hands-on experience
about some of the different technologies, are informing us and
everyone else.
Mr. Gingrey. Sure. Well, it is intriguing, and I have to
say, I mean, the highway departments in the various states, and
mine in particular, you know, they are concerned about
repainting the lines, and making sure the shoulders are safe,
and things like that. So, even if you put some of these things
in place, you worry about the O&M.
Ms. Shepherd, the training and technology transfer. In the
end, the implementation of these technologies is going to
require the local developers and the planning boards to accept
their use. It is kind of in the same line of reasoning that I
had with Mr. Grumbles.
Ms. Shepherd, in your testimony, you mentioned two programs
that provide training and technical assistance for individuals,
the National Highway Institute and the Local Technical
Assistance Program. How many individuals actually participate
in these programs during the course of the year, and what are
the two key differences in these programs?
Ms. Shepherd. The NHI, the National Highway Institute, is
the training arm of the Federal Highway Administration. That
particular part of the organization offers and develops
training based on the specific subject matter discipline. So,
in this area, it would be the environment and stormwater
management specifically, and for your question, it would be
related to things like O&M and all the things that are
associated with stormwater management.
We are developing a course now on environmental
considerations in the construction, meaning stormwater
management, area. We work with the states to host, and the
states are welcome to invite the local governments to
participate in that training, so the states actually sponsor
the training in connection with our National Highway Institute.
And they are free, because the states are actually supporting
the training. They are actually able to open up seats to that
training to their local partners, their local governments
within that state.
In addition, there is the Local Technical Assistance
Program (LTAP). There are 58 in the country, and that includes
Puerto Rico. There are multiple LTAPs in a number of states.
And there are seven LTAPs throughout the country, mostly,
obviously, located in the western part of the country. And a
lot of them are through the university systems and some of them
are through the State highway administrations.
Those programs are well attended, because what they do is
they actually reach out to the locals, the grassroots
organizations, the local State highway administrations and
their transportation professionals. They find out what the
needs of the specific areas are and try to gear training and
technical assistance, technical deployment, based on what those
local governments say their priorities are. So, it is very much
a hands-on approach with the local governments.
Mr. Gingrey. Ms. Shepherd and Mr. Grumbles, thank you. I am
sorry, Mr. Chairman. I took way beyond my five minutes, but I
talk slow. It wasn't their fault.
Chairman Wu. Now, we appreciate the gentility of the
gentleman from Georgia, and we are down to about three minutes
before the vote, but I understand that Dr. Ehlers has a
question, and we would like to get this done before we take a
potentially significant break.
Mr. Ehlers. Well, I am from Michigan. We don't talk much
faster than Georgia, but I just very quickly want to make a
point. I am on the Transportation Committee, too. When we did
the last reauthorization, SAFETEA-LU, I was chairing this
subcommittee, and we fought very, very hard to get more
research money into the Department of Transportation. We did
not succeed very well.
And I am wondering, since you are involved in this area, I
found it totally absurd that we have a multi-billion dollar
industry, so to speak. I don't know of any other multi-billion
dollar industry in the world that spends so little on research
as the Department of Transportation does. Have things improved
at all? Are you dedicating more funding to research or not?
Ms. Shepherd. What we do is, since you acknowledge that,
though transportation research funds were not there, as they
were, as they have been historically, what we have done is we
have tried to do a lot more cooperative efforts with our
partners, like the states or AASHTO, for example, the American
Association of State Highway Transportation Officials.
As you know, sir, the states are required, through the
State planning and research programs, that two percent of all
the major categories in SAFETEA-LU are set aside for research.
Furthermore, we passed that to the states. Of that money, the
states have to set aside 25 percent of that money that can only
be spent on research and development. So, what we do is we try
to pool, albeit, our limited funding, with the states and their
funds, to try to address their priority areas. We also try to
work with the Transportation Research Board through their
National Cooperative Highway Research Program and a number of
other efforts.
So, what we have done is, because of the limitations, we
have learned to reach out and try to pool funding together to
address some of these major issues, by trying to increase the
flexibilities for moving funding around, given the limited
amount of research revenues. So, you are right. There is a
significant shortage of funding that is dedicated to research,
but we try to make the best use that we can of what we have.
Mr. Ehlers. Well, thank you for this slight bit of
encouragement, and I am going to leave it up to you to raise
the funds even more. Thank you very much.
Mr. Grumbles. Could I just add something?
Chairman Wu. Well, Mr. Grumbles, perhaps we could take your
additional comment in the record. We are somewhat under 30
seconds for this first of five votes, and I want to apologize
to all the witnesses and the attendees. We will have to step
away for however long it takes us to cast these five votes, and
then we will reconvene.
The Committee is in recess.
[Whereupon, at 2:58 p.m., the Subcommittee was recessed, to
reconvene at 3:48 p.m., the same day.]
Chairman Wu. I want to thank the forbearance of the
witnesses and the attendees, and at this point, I would like to
recommence testimony, with Commissioner Sam Adams. Sam, please
proceed.
Panel 2:
STATEMENT OF MR. SAM ADAMS, COMMISSIONER OF PUBLIC UTILITIES,
CITY OF PORTLAND, OREGON
Mr. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and Ranking Member, and
Committee Members, for the opportunity to share with you some
of the lessons learned, and barriers that stand in the way, and
uncertainties that stand in the way of further application in
the City of Portland. And in talking to my colleagues in other
cities and local governments across the United States,
selectively, sort of the challenges that they have told me, in
terms of greater implementation of green transportation
technology.
I also want to acknowledge your leadership on this issue,
not only just here in Congress but also your willingness to go
out with us, as Transportation Commissioner, and see the
projects up close and personally. We are very grateful. Thank
you for your leadership.
The City of Portland gets 37 inches of rain annually, and
that translates into about 17 billion gallons of
transportation-related stormwater runoff. In Oregon, Portland
specifically, it rains many days of the year, but the number of
inches, and the amount of stormwater produced by the
transportation system, is commensurate with a lot of cities
across the United States. Sometimes, it comes in
thundershowers, sometimes in snow, but many cities across the
United States have the challenge or opportunity to deal with
stormwater.
In the City of Portland, starting in 1994, when we came
under the jurisdiction of the State Department of Environmental
Quality and the EPA for sewer overflow discharges into the
Willamette River, we have been working very aggressively to do
the research and development and the experimentation, and the
proving of transportation-related green stormwater approaches.
It really took a changing, not only just of technology, but
really, of outlook, that up to that point, stormwater had
largely been treated as a waste product or ignored. Stormwater
was either piped directly in through the treated system, or
directly into the river, which means if it hit the river, it
was warm, it was dirty, and it was fast-moving. It was not the
kind of stream inflows to the Willamette River, which is our
major river, that we were looking for.
Instead, sort of trying to turn things around, and doing it
in a way that could save money to local ratepayers. Instead,
our goal was to get stormwater to percolate into the ground as
much as possible. Thirty percent of our main river and most of
our watersheds come up from below, and if the water comes up
from below, it tends to be cool, clean, and it recharges the
river in the most beneficial way.
A couple of examples of just pictures of the kinds of
stormwater technologies that mimic, as you heard from Mr.
Grumbles, that mimic the natural environment. This is a curb
extension, all three of these examples are retrofits of the
existing system in the City of Portland, in which we have 4,000
miles of streets and roads. That is a curb extension in a
residential area. This is actually a sidewalk planter. That is
in use in downtown Portland, taking a very narrow, a narrow
part of the sidewalk in the street, and turning it into a
functioning swale. And then, the third one is an example of
pervious pavers. Your next witness is going to talk about
pervious concretes. I don't want to steal any of his thunder,
but we use that as well. These are pervious pavers in the
parking strip.
In terms of what stands in the way of more application of
these things, it has been touched upon, but it really is when,
like me, when you are running a local government agency. In my
case, I am responsible for transportation. As you mentioned,
environmental services is a euphemism for the sewer agency. We
don't have the luxury of taking risks that can come with
unclear federal regulations. In the City of Portland, we push
further than most, but most cities won't do that. So, some of
the barriers that we have faced, and that I hear from my
colleagues around the country, is a lack of alignment of
regulatory policies, with green infrastructure initiatives
within EPA, and with the transportation agencies on the federal
level.
There has been some positive forward motion, in terms of
improving green technologies for inclusion into federally
funded projects, but as detailed in my testimony, we feel like
there is a long ways to go. Because there is a lack of federal
standards, it means that a lot of the local governments simply
will not choose to try to build the green stormwater facilities
simply because they don't know what the rules of success are.
Even though in the City of Portland, we are achieving between a
20 and 60 percent reduction in green stormwater facilities,
than if we had tried to treat that same amount of stormwater
through a traditional drainpipe method.
So, I appreciate the opportunity to testify. I look forward
to questions and answers.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Adams follows:]
Prepared Statement of Sam Adams
Chairman Wu, Members of the Subcommittee:
It's an honor to discuss with you the challenges and opportunities
of green transportation technologies.
I am Sam Adams, a member of the City Council for the City of
Portland, Oregon, and the Commissioner-in-Charge of Portland's Office
of Transportation and Bureau of Environmental Services.
Portland is a city of 563,000 residents, inhabiting 145 square
miles, spread over five watersheds at the confluence of the Columbia
and Willamette Rivers. The City's transportation system consists of
4,000 miles of local streets and arterials. The sanitary sewer and
stormwater utilities operate 2,400 miles of sanitary, stormwater and
combined sewers, 9,000 stormwater sumps and two wastewater treatment
plants.
Portland receives 37 inches of precipitation per year, producing 17
billion gallons of transportation-related stormwater runoff.
Historically, we have treated this stormwater as a waste product:
channeled to a sewer or piped directly to the Willamette River. This
approach simultaneously deprived the river of clean, cool groundwater
from below, while flooding it with warm and dirty surface runoff. We
are committed to reverse this approach and begin to value stormwater
runoff as an asset for watershed health. To that end, I am pleased to
report that Portland is the first city in the Nation to adopt
comprehensive green street policies to address the interrelated
challenges of street design and stormwater management.
I appear before you today to provide the following recommendations
on the ways the Federal Government can promote the further development
and use of green transportation infrastructure:
1. Align Regulatory Policies with Green Initiatives.
I would like to recognize Representatives Ehlers and Honda of this
Subcommittee, and Ben Grumbles of the Office of Water at the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for promoting green technologies
at the federal level.
The Congressional Statement of Support for Green Infrastructure
sends an important signal to Members of Congress about the need for a
new approach to public works. And EPA's Green Infrastructure Statement
of Intent establishes an important partnership with the National
Association of Clean Water Agencies (NACWA) and Natural Resources
Defense Council (NRDC) to expand the use of green technologies
nationally.
Now that a national policy consensus is taking shape, it is time
for EPA and other federal agencies to align their regulatory policies
accordingly. Existing policies and rules must be reviewed and updated
to reflect the green revolution that is occurring in the environmental
sciences and civil engineering.
Portland is currently dealing with two issues where EPA's
regulatory policies are frustrating our efforts to use green
technologies:
In 2001, Portland attempted to get regulatory
approval for a comprehensive plan to eliminate combined sewer
overflows (CSOs), advance our compliance with the Endangered
Species Act, and improve watershed health. Our ``Clean River
Plan'' called for integrated watershed planning, green
technologies and multi-purpose infrastructure investments
applied over a 20-year period. Unfortunately, our Plan failed
to get support from the Oregon Department of Environmental
Quality and EPA. In fact, EPA said our 2001 efforts were the
root cause of enforcement actions that Portland is dealing with
now six years later. Both agencies favored traditional
engineered solutions that assured regulatory compliance within
a tightly constrained timetable. Neither agency was willing to
provide additional time for Portland to pursue more
sustainable, cost effective and affordable strategies that also
promoted comprehensive watershed health. Had Portland spent
more time over the past several decades developing green
technologies, we would have been able to reduce the size and
expense of traditional technologies.
Green technologies incorporate stormwater quality
protections to produce discharges that are an asset to
watershed health. These discharges more closely emulate the
natural water cycle and provide multiple ecosystem benefits.
EPA considers these treated discharges as a waste product and a
potential risk to groundwater. This interpretation produces
regulations that make it cumbersome, costly and risky to use
surface infiltrating green technologies by requiring green
technologies to be equipped with redundant filtering systems.
The expanded use of green technologies will be significantly
hindered if EPA does not revise its current policy on
stormwater infiltrating through sumps and drywells.
Municipalities and private developers will not take advantage
of such technologies as flow-through planters and street swales
that use specially designed landscaping to filter, detain and
reduce stormwater runoff before it is discharged to a sewer,
outfall or sump.
2. Incorporate Green Technologies into Federal Transportation Policies
and Programs.
Federal and State highways traverse Portland, discharging about
five billion gallons of stormwater runoff per year. These discharges
contain heavy metals, solvents, chemicals, particulates, heat and other
pollutants that find their way into our groundwater, rivers and
streams. Investments in the upgrade, replacement and addition of new
transportation infrastructure must include provisions for green
transportation technologies. As with the EPA, we strongly recommend
that the U.S. Department of Transportation and State transportation
agencies adopt the use of green technologies wherever practical, and
coordinate their stormwater management improvements with those of
municipalities. In addition, federal and State agencies should be
required to compensate municipalities for the costs of managing
stormwater discharges from federal and State highways.
3. Support Research and Development of Green Technologies.
Developing new technologies is an expensive and risky business. A
national program of innovative design and product development will help
jump start the use of green transportation infrastructure, and promote
the creation of green economies throughout the country. Such a program
should be coordinated with EPA, National Association of Clean Water
Agencies (NACWA), Natural Resource Defense Council (NRDC), State
environmental agencies, universities and municipalities. A national
technology development program fits nicely into EPA's Green
Infrastructure Statement of Intent and the Congressional Statement of
Support for Green Infrastructure.
4. Support Research on the Appropriate Placement and Performance of
Green Technologies.
Developing new green technologies is not enough. Many states and
municipalities are trying to determine which green technologies provide
the most benefits given specific site characteristics and watershed
conditions. Research on the performance of green technologies needs to
become a national priority if we are serious about their effective use.
Coincidentally, compliance with current Clean Water Act requirements
for the application of stormwater best management practices (BMPs) to
the maximum extent practicable (MEP) is also reliant on a solid
demonstration of the effectiveness of those BMPs. As with technology
development, research on ``BMP effectiveness'' must be coordinated with
the EPA, NACWA, NRDC, State environmental agencies, universities and
municipalities. The research must be sensitive to the regional
variations of hydrology, climate, plant biology, soils and other
factors that impact the effectiveness of green technologies. The
research should include ongoing and statistically-significant
monitoring to determine the long-term effectiveness of green
technologies. And the research must be transferable to and among the
end users such as municipalities, State agencies, private developers,
and EPA.
5. Support Research on the Costs and Benefits of Green Technologies.
It is difficult for policy-makers and the public to see the full
costs of environmental degradation and the full value of green
technologies to restore watershed health. As a society, we have not
developed a comprehensive method of accounting for the full costs and
benefits of stormwater management. We have not placed an economic value
on stormwater that incorporates the full costs of old technologies and
the full value of ecosystem benefits. If we are going to begin to make
decisions in the best long-term interests of society and the planet,
this must change. A national research program of economic research into
the costs and benefits of different stormwater management technologies
is an essential companion to research on BMP effectiveness. Solid
economic analysis will support State and local efforts to develop fair,
equitable and adequate funding mechanisms for public stormwater
management, and provide the necessary basis for the development of new
market-based initiatives.
6. Support the Development of Information Technologies and Systems
Modeling.
Portland has spent more than a decade and millions of dollars
developing geographical information systems (GIS), watershed
characterization techniques and planning tools needed to make informed
decisions about capital investments in stormwater and sanitary sewer
infrastructure. Our systems are well tested and accurate at a localized
level of planning. We developed these tools out of necessity, in
support of our CSO response, in a watershed context. Soon we will add
new tools to manage our capital assets and further inform our decisions
about facilities maintenance and replacement. We have learned that such
tools are indispensable to comprehensive and integrated watershed
planning. Any national program to promote green technologies must
include programs to deliver planning tools and training to
municipalities and states.
These recommendations are offered based on nearly two decades of
ground-breaking work on green technologies by the City of Portland. I
believe Portland comes by its leadership position on green
transportation honestly. After years of experimentation, we have
embraced green technologies as a core value to manage stormwater runoff
from all City streets. We have designed and installed award winning
street planters, rain gardens and swales that integrate seamlessly into
the urban landscape. These green technologies take pressure off our
combined sewer system, soften the streetscape and infiltrate stormwater
to recharge our streams and rivers. When coupled with trees and native
vegetation, our green streets increase evapotranspiration and carbon
sequestration, reduce the urban heat island effect, provide traffic
calming, and add landscape amenities for adjacent private property.
These benefits are not possible with traditional approaches to street
drainage.
Examples of Green Transportation Technologies
Consider the following three examples of cost-effective and
sustainable green transportation technologies:
Portland has found very simple ways to turn
traditional streets into green streets without spending
substantial sums for planning, design and engineering. Simple
street swales capture, filter and infiltrate stormwater runoff
before it has a chance of getting into traditional combined or
separated sewers. These swale are carved out of the existing
street along the curb immediately upstream of a sewer inlet.
Abutting property owners participated in the selection of
native plants and help with simple maintenance.
Portland has developed award-winning infiltration
planters that collect and infiltrate street runoff within the
tight dimensions of an urban streetscape. The planters are
sunken below the level of the sidewalk and receive stormwater
through grated curb cuts. Some designs allow stormwater to flow
in and out of multiple planters during heavy rain events.
Native vegetation and trees facilitate drainage and provide
multiple ecosystem benefits.
Porous pavement and pervious pavers offer another
type of green technology that provides a way for stormwater to
filter into soils rather than flow into sewers, streams and
rivers. Portland uses both types of green paving depending on
site conditions, land uses and traffic patterns. In the case of
pervious pavers, Portland uses traditional asphalt paving for
the heavily-used traveling lanes of neighborhood streets.
Pervious pavers are concentrated in the parking areas where
runoff can be captured and filtered into the ground. Special
soils are used to facilitate infiltration. The project takes
stormwater runoff out of local combined sewers, and increases
groundwater recharge for the benefit of local streets. The
street design is very well received by local residents.
Integrating Green and Traditional Technologies
Portland's stormwater systems reflect the evolution of science,
engineering and regulation over the City's 156-year life. For most of
our history, we conveyed stormwater as quickly as possible to our
streams and rivers without much thought about the consequences. As we
developed into an urban center, we added combined sewers, separated
stormwater sewers, sumps, and pollution reduction facilities. Today, we
pursue comprehensive strategies that treat stormwater as an asset for
watershed health. We incorporate natural functions into our
infrastructure to complement, enhance and strengthen our watersheds.
Portland will always have a complex and overlapping system of older
sewers and newer green technologies. Our challenge and our opportunity
are to align and integrate the older and newer technologies in ways and
at locations that maximize their benefit to our watersheds.
Lessons Learned
In Portland, we have fundamentally redefined ``technology'' and
``infrastructure'' in order to capture the full potential of green
streets and sustainable stormwater management. To do otherwise would
have perpetuated our reliance on traditional infrastructure that is
ineffective, unsustainable and works in opposition to natural systems.
Portland has moved beyond traditional transportation engineering
principles to embrace a comprehensive and multi-disciplinary approach
to infrastructure based on natural systems, soils, hydrologic function,
biology, chemistry and plant sciences. We view stormwater as an asset
rather than a liability. We look for opportunities to seamlessly
integrate man-made structures into the urban landscape in ways that
enhance and strengthen the natural functions of our watersheds.
As with any new technology or innovation, our early efforts
required additional investments in research, planning and design.
However, after more than a decade of experience, our recent green
street projects are increasingly cost-effective. Our most recent pre-
design for green street projects identify design and construction
savings of 20 percent to 63 percent over traditional storm sewer
systems. These savings are calculated without accounting for the value
of improved air and water quality, increased natural habitat, and other
ecosystem benefits.
In Closing
A transition from traditional to green technologies is unavoidable.
We must hasten the change by expanding our definition of technology and
infrastructure to integrate built and natural environments. Green
technologies marry together science, engineering and design to
construct green infrastructure that is seamless, sustainable and cost
effective. We need a partnership with federal and State agencies,
universities and others to affect a fundamental change to green
transportation technologies. This subcommittee can take an important
first step by giving careful consideration to my recommendations:
Redefine Technology and Infrastructure
Align Regulatory Policies with Green Initiatives
Incorporate Green Technologies into Federal
Transportation Policies and Programs
Support Research and Development of Green
Technologies
Support Research on BMP Effectiveness and Performance
Measures
Support Research into the Economic Value of
Stormwater Management
Support the Development of Information Technologies
and Systems Modeling
Thank you for your attention and interest. I will gladly entertain
any questions.
Biography for Sam Adams
Sam Adams was elected to the Portland City Council in 2005.
Commissioner Adams oversees the Office of Transportation and the Bureau
of Environmental Services. Upon receiving the two assignments, he
immediately seized upon the opportunity to develop a citywide
greenstreets policy, which requires greenstreet development for all
newly constructed or reconstructed roadways unless technically
infeasible. The comprehensive greenstreets policy follows the city
council passage of the comprehensive Watershed Management Plan, the
Nation's first citywide urban natural resource baseline and plan for
sustainable resource management. Still not satisfied with his
environmental leadership, Commissioner Adams has now directed the
Bureau of Environmental Services to development a Green City Strategy,
which aims to manage all the city's stormwater in a sustainable manner.
Portland's sustainable management initiatives are necessary to
complement a federal court-mandated $1.4 billion investment in
underground sewer infrastructure to mitigate combined sewer overflows.
Commissioner Adams is a strong advocate for the environment and has
used his role at the City of Portland to pursue strong policies that
reduce our impact on the naturescape and seek alternatives to
traditional transportation and sewer infrastructures.
Prior to serving a City Commissioner, Sam Adams served as Chief of
Staff to Mayor Vera Katz for 11 years. In the Mayor's office he helped
lead projects to revitalize the Willamette River and expand light rail
service to the Portland International Airport.
Commissioner Adams started his political career with Representative
Peter De Fazio, who represents the Fourth District of Oregon. Sam Adams
earned a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from The University of
Oregon.
Chairman Wu. Thank you very much. Mr. Huffman, welcome to
the Committee.
STATEMENT OF MR. DANIEL J. HUFFMAN, MANAGING DIRECTOR, NATIONAL
RESOURCES, NATIONAL READY MIXED CONCRETE ASSOCIATION
Mr. Huffman. Thank you. Good afternoon, Chairman Wu, and
Ranking Member Gingrey, and Congressman Ehlers. Mr. Chairman,
as a resident of your district, I am especially pleased to
appear before you today to discuss the environmental benefits
of pervious concrete pavements.
My testimony will provide a brief overview of the
properties of pervious concrete, some real world applications,
and industry efforts to enhance its broad utilization. Pervious
concrete is a leading edge infiltration technology. Its limited
use in the United States in pavement began about 25 years ago,
and primarily, in Florida.
Pervious concrete can be a major element of low impact
development, and could provide for substantial water
harvesting. It already has been accepted by EPA as a
recommended best management practice (BMP), and the U.S. Green
Building Council's LEED Program allows the use of pervious
concrete to contribute towards certification.
Pervious concrete is a performance engineered structural
material used in the constituents of conventional Portland
cement concrete, only with little or no sand in the mixture,
allowing for a 15 to 30 percent air void factor. Taking
advantage of the decreased density, pervious concrete is
incredibly permeable while still able to provide a quality
structural pavement. The use of pervious concrete pavement
supports the many positives of infiltration technology,
including both groundwater recharge and attempts to control
increasing aquifer depletion.
Because a picture says a thousand words, I would like to
provide some visualization. Represented on the left is a sample
of pervious concrete, such as this one with me today. You can
see the moisture falling onto the top of the pervious concrete,
immediately passing through, and immediately coming out the
bottom. The schematic on the right demonstrates how moisture
falls onto a slab of pervious concrete, represented by the gray
solid material on the top. The moisture is filtered, as it
moves through the concrete, and then passes through the
granular base reservoir, where it is temporarily stored, before
it is percolated into the subgrade, where in addition to
providing groundwater recharge, it also provides substantial
moisture to the root systems of surrounding vegetation as if no
hardscape ever existed.
This is a Sam's Club Discount Store parking lot in Atlanta,
Georgia. On your left, you can see moisture accumulated on the
surface of conventional asphalt pavement immediately following
a rain event. On the same site, the photo on the right shows
the pervious concrete slab that was later constructed, and you
can see the comparison at the same time. This is a parking lot
of a Wal-Mart store in Denver, Colorado. In the background, you
can see conventional asphalt during a rain event, with the
expected standing water in many places, while in the foreground
is a test section of pervious concrete, which appears to show
no effects of moisture at all.
The Safeway grocery store on the left has a complete
parking lot of pervious concrete, and is shown as it looked on
April 11, 2005, the following morning after a 12 inch snowfall
had closed the Denver airport. The parking lot was plowed the
night before, and as soon as the sun appeared, most of the
remaining moisture quickly melted, and passed through the
pervious concrete. The photo on the right was taken at the same
time, and represents the conventional pavement immediately
across the street, which was later turned to ice when the sun
went down. The temperatures dropped, and the moisture standing
on the surface refroze.
This is the parking lot of Finley Field at the University
of Tennessee at Chattanooga. The aerial view shows pervious
concrete, the light stripes or strips that you see there,
surrounded by conventional asphalt. This shows just one means
of using pervious concrete for water harvesting, as the
moisture trapped in the granular base system immediately
beneath the pervious concrete is pumped over to the pinkish
roof building on the left, which was converted into a cistern.
From the cistern, the water is used to water all the vegetation
of the surrounding areas of the parking lot and the nearby
baseball field. This building was built, or the project was
built about 12 years ago, and is still in very good condition.
And finally, this is a pervious concrete street in
Portland, Oregon, which demonstrates the ability to use
pervious concrete also on roadways. I took a look at the street
just the other night, Mr. Chairman, and to me, it looked even
better, as shown in this picture. I can declare it as what we
would project to be a 20 to 30 year pavement. Here you can see
pervious concrete being poured onto a slab, where concrete, the
moisture is expected to infiltrate at a rate in excess of 200
inches per square foot per hour, which is typical of what we
get with pervious concrete.
NRMCA recognizes that sustainable development and
environmentally friendly pavement technologies are balancing
human needs with the Earth's capacity to meet them. Concrete
offers a wide range of capabilities to help achieve this
balance. In particular, pervious concrete offers a compelling
solution to the many stormwater challenges confronted by
communities around the Nation. NRMCA is a lead participant in
the development of guideline specifications for the design and
use of pervious concrete through its participation on the
American Concrete Institute's Technical Committee focused on
this technology. In addition, NRMCA sponsors a national program
for the certification of concrete, pervious concrete
contractors that is delivered regionally and locally, and
resulting in 1,200 certifications in the last 18 months.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my statement. I would be
pleased to answer any questions you or any of the Members of
the subcommittee may have.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Huffman follows:]
Prepared Statement of Daniel J. Huffman
The National Ready Mixed Concrete Association (NRMCA) appreciates
this opportunity to share its views on green transportation
infrastructure technologies and the challenges that exist to
incorporating these technologies into current infrastructure projects.
NRMCA is a national trade association representing producers of
ready mixed concrete and those companies that provide materials,
equipment, and support to the ready mixed concrete industry. Our
association has been working vigorously over the past several years to
promote the broader use of concrete materials as an environmentally
friendly technology. These technologies exist within the realm of
concrete materials being broadly produced today especially as it
relates to concrete pavements. Pervious concrete pavement is just one
of many forms of concrete that are especially beneficial for
environmental transportation related applications. In addition, there
is a vast range of highly significant environmental qualities that
conventional concrete contributes to transportation and all other
environmental applications depending upon the targeted goal (i.e.,
urban heat island mitigation, energy savings, use of re-cycled
materials, etc.)
GREEN PAVEMENT TECHNOLOGIES
Pervious Concrete
Material known as pervious concrete is especially compelling as a
leading edge green building technology. It was reportedly first used in
Europe more than 100 years ago for non-pavement applications, its
limited use in the United States in pavement began only 20-25 years ago
and primarily in Florida. In addition to offering the opportunity to
deploy a major element of Low Impact Development (LID) and even
initiate substantial Water Harvesting, pervious concrete already has
established acceptance by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) as a recommended Best Management Practice (BMP) means of
stormwater management on a local basis. However, it has recently
garnered much attention due to increasingly stringent Clean Water Act
stormwater management guidelines and particularly in response to the
National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Phase II
Stormwater Program. Among other modifications, Phase II applied
guidelines to commercial projects sites of one acre or more and
combined with the increasing focus on LID have greatly stimulated
interest in infiltration technology, which is essentially what pervious
concrete provides.
Pervious concrete is a performance-engineered structural material
using the usual constituents of conventional portland cement concrete,
only with little or no sand in the mixture, allowing for a 15-30
percent air void factor. Taking advantage of the corresponding
decreased density, pervious concrete is incredibly permeable while
still able to provide a quality structural pavement. Instead of
moisture (i.e., rain/snow melt) running off the surface horizontally,
virtually all stormwater falling onto the pavement is immediately
infiltrated directly through the pavement and eventually into the
subgrade. In most places in the United States, placed immediately below
the pavement is an even more porous aggregate base layer that functions
as a stormwater reservoir accommodating all the precipitation necessary
for a design storm event. The depth and volume of the aggregate base
layer is calculated relative to the percolation rate of the native
soils along with the expected rates of moisture that need to be
infiltrated over time. Where there are poor percolating soils or other
hydrology challenges, outfall designs and supplementary drainage may be
required for which perforated piping systems and other devices exist.
Pavement design thicknesses are adjusted to meet the necessary load
bearing capability for a broad range of applications. Properly designed
and placed pervious concrete usually results in a pavement that can
pass water at a rate in excess of 200 inches of rain per hour thus
exceeding the requirements of almost any design storm event. The use of
pervious concrete supports the many positives of infiltration
technology including both groundwater recharge and attempts to control
increasing aquifer depletion.
Pervious Concrete--Benefits and Costs
Pervious concrete provides many environmental and some cost
benefits by reducing stormwater volume, limits the amount of pollutants
being carried away by runoff into our waterways, lakes, and oceans.
However, in addition to improving overall water quality by reducing the
volume of runoff, pervious concrete performs effectively as a filter of
the moisture it infiltrates. The complex matrix of aggregate, hardened
cementitious paste, and air voids retains at least 80 percent of the
pollutant solids. With the aid of naturally occurring microorganisms
also within the matrix of the pavement, a substantial level of
treatment of the retained solids takes place which are only further
enhanced by exposure to the elements over time (varying temperature and
sun, etc.) It is generally accepted that what pollutants do pass
through the pervious concrete system (including the granular base
layer) are further converted by native soils and the total affect on
groundwater is positive in terms of water quality and level of
replenishment.
Far and away the most common application of pervious concrete is
for commercial parking lots. Also, its use in residential street
applications is slowly growing as is that for major pedestrian areas of
all types, and there is increasing interest even for the largest of
retail shopping centers. Unlike so many other green building
technologies that may come with increased cost, most major utilizations
of pervious concrete technology, such as for commercial parking lots,
benefit from a lowered first-cost of construction when considered on an
overall project site basis. While hard cost data is often difficult to
obtain, that relating to the experience of one residential housing
developer is perhaps representative of how the optimization of pervious
concrete can lower the first-cost of construction and also provide
additional revenue through increased site optimization:
In 2006, owner/developer Craig Morrison of CMI Homes in Bellevue,
WA, completed the construction of a 20 home residential subdivision in
Sultan, WA, called Stratford Place. 100 percent of the subdivision's
original general hardscape was built with pervious concrete--roadway,
driveways, and sidewalks. CMI has provided cost data supporting the
cost savings resulting from the conversion from a site estimate using
conventional asphalt pavement and traditional on-site stormwater
detention to one where pervious concrete was actually used. While the
developer is rather detailed in his calculations showing a net savings
overall of approximately $264,000, he could also have projected
increased net revenue relating to the development of two additional
home sites he was able to add resulting from the elimination of the
traditional stormwater treatment system.
The CMI case demonstrates that progressive owners and developers
see the use of a green technology like pervious concrete as a public
relations opportunity and have been rewarded by some agencies in the
permitting process for proposing and building with green technologies.
NPDES Phase II regulations requiring the treatment of runoff prior to
it leaving a site presents very attractive cost and site optimization
dynamics to an owner who deploys pervious concrete. The site
optimization dynamic is not always easy to quantify in financial terms
but it is frequently perceived by some owners as highly valuable. The
positive for pervious concrete in this respect is that it has the
ability to provide a multi-functional facility that to a stormwater
professional will function as stormwater treatment system yet to a
facilities owner it is a parking lot.
Moreover, traditional stormwater management devices such as
retention/detention ponds, swales, and similar devices are greatly
lessened and in most cases totally eliminated where pervious concrete
is deployed on a major scale. In some cases, pressures are so great on
major big box retailers to be responsive to stormwater regulations yet
with the perceived increasing lack of ``good sites'' in most major
metropolitan areas they sometimes spend millions of dollars per major
big box store to construct underground stormwater treatment systems to
accommodate an acceptable minimum amount of on-site parking. With the
optimization of pervious concrete, an owner could instead eliminate the
conventional devices (which may consume 10-20 percent of a site) and
maintain or expand the area of his parking lot, possibly increase the
footprint of his building, or use the increased optimization for some
other revenue generating or aesthetic purpose. The bottom line
economics strongly suggest that it is usually less costly to build with
pervious concrete on an overall site basis compared to all that relates
to traditional stormwater device utilization. Indeed, the financial
benefits of increased site optimization are potentially highly
significant and for a high volume big box retailer could be paramount
depending on other site location dynamics.
Pervious concrete also has a number of other important benefits.
Like conventional concrete it is a ``hard-riding'' surface that
provides less resistance and therefore greater fuel efficiency.
Pervious concrete can have a substantial effect on sound mitigation.
Much of the sound of tires rolling on pavement relates to the way air
is compressed and released ``as the rubber hits the road.'' The open
graded surface of pervious concrete diminishes this sound effect as it
does much to allow air not to become trapped beneath moving vehicle
tires. Instead, air can move relatively easily within the upper layers
of the pervious concrete void matrix thereby muffling any road noise.
There is also strong evidence that in many places in the country
subjected to snowfall, snowmelt actually leaves the surface of pervious
concrete much faster than that of conventional pavement because the
moisture has a place to go--directly down. This rapid removal of
snowmelt greatly limits the likelihood of ice formation on pavement due
to snowmelt refreezing when day time sun and ambient temperatures may
convert snow to liquid but then subjects it to becoming ICE when night
falls, temperatures drop and it refreezes.
Pervious Concrete Contributes to Environmental Protection
A largely untapped and potentially huge opportunity exists for
society to HARVEST STORMWATER. This could especially be of interest in
the very dry climates of the far west and other areas of the country
with increasing pressure on the water supply. While the strategy
focused on green roof technology to harvest stormwater is sound and
getting a large amount of attention, we are barely scratching the
surface on the potential to broadly harvest stormwater through the
technology pervious concrete represents. The amount of hardscape that
is non-roof material offers vast potential. Taking the example of many
retail shopping centers, the surface area of on-grade parking is
generally considered to be three to four times that of the buildings it
is serving. Why not use pervious concrete to harvest water for gray
water re-use? The technology to do that already exists and is
relatively simple. 12 years ago at Finely Stadium, a sports venue at
the University of Tennessee (Chattanooga), a parking lot was
constructed using pervious concrete in all the parking spaces. The
water passing through the pervious concrete into the granular base
reservoir is piped to an existing site adjacent building that was
modified to become a cistern. The water that otherwise would have been
pollutant carrying runoff 12 years ago has been used instead as gray
water for watering not only the vegetation directly on the site but
also a nearby baseball field.
Other important environmental benefits supporting the use of
pervious concrete include its potential to save energy. Like
conventional concrete, portland cement and other supplementary
cementitious materials are used in pervious concrete pavement and are
much LIGHTER in color than the binder used by their respective
petroleum based counterparts. Concrete is vastly superior in light
reflectivity, increasingly evaluated by Solar Reflectance Index (SRI),
so the amount of night illumination and its corresponding energy could
be greatly reduced where some concrete pavements are deployed.
Additionally, concrete's superior position as a pavement to enhance
urban heat island mitigation is well documented by the EPA and other
study groups. The decreased density of pervious concrete also has a
positive effect on heat island dynamics because of the way it simply
absorbs less heat in the first place, a quality that may not
specifically relate only to its superior SRI. As it relates to
temperature dynamics, and beyond that directed primarily at the cost of
energy, the concern for stormwater runoff's thermal pollution is also
benefited through the use of pervious concrete. Unlike other man-made
pavements, pervious concrete does not share the heat retaining
properties that contribute to thermal pollution Less than optimally
controlled levels of stormwater runoff are known to increase the
temperature of streams, rivers, lakes, and perhaps may have some effect
on ocean temperatures. This thermal pollution of waterways negatively
effects the survival of fish and various riparian life.
Energy Savings & Urban Heat Island Mitigation
While energy savings and urban heat island mitigation are clearly
not technologies, due to their critical roles in the battle to combat
global warming, concrete's great potential to benefit in that battle
must be addressed. While in the context of pervious concrete, energy
savings was briefly discussed; conventional concrete may be even more
underutilized as a means of providing impressive energy savings. The
Solar Reflectance Index (SRI) data supporting the benefit conventional
concrete provides due to its potential to lessen the need for night
illumination is only one aspect of energy savings.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
The U.S. Green Building Council's LEED green building rating system
recognizes the value of the albedo or reflectivity dynamic and allows
credit toward LEED certification relative to SRI capability. The
differences in pavement materials in night lighting situations is even
more pronounced in wet weather conditions when ``dark wet roads'' seem
to absorb the light given off by vehicle headlights which are only
compounded when ``puddles'' and pot holes also exist. At least one
extensive study documents that a 35 percent reduction in the amount of
lighting required is warranted where conventional concrete is used
instead of the most commonly used pavement material. Another means of
taking advantage of concrete's superior SRI would not save energy but
would improve public safety. That is, allow for the use of concrete
pavement's increased brightness while not eliminating the additional
light poles required of the other type of pavement so as to provide
better night driving conditions on roadways and parking lots, and to
improve pedestrian safety through increased night visibility. The
option also exists for improved security in high crime areas due to
increased brightness. Possibly, the best option is to take advantage of
concrete's reflectivity to seek the middle ground in energy reduction
and safety consideration relative to the specific environment--the best
of both worlds.
The energy savings issue and conventional concrete's superior SRI
are also closely linked to urban heat island mitigation dynamics. Where
higher SRI materials are used, they are holding and generating less
heat which in warmer climates would result in a corresponding energy
savings especially as it relates to air conditioning utilization. Where
some major urban areas are thought to have ambient temperature
increases of up to eight degrees F. due to heat island effects, the
potentials to mitigate with the expanded utilization of concrete
pavements presents significant impact potentials not only on the
immediate amount of energy consumption but as it relates to the
negative health effects of ozone and smog, etc.
MEASURING ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT
Answering the question of what makes a product environmentally
friendly is difficult and complex. It is important that there is a
predictable and reliable process for answering this question because
both citizens and their elected representatives are concerned about the
environmental consequences of producing and using various materials and
products and they are demanding ``green'' products. This is the result
of a societal awareness that consumption of manufactured products have
an effect on resources and the environment. These effects, which can be
direct or indirect, occur at every stage in a product's life cycle--
from the extraction of the raw materials from the ground through the
processing, manufacturing, and transportation phases, ending with use
and disposal or recycling. One methodology increasingly in use today is
life cycle assessment (LCA), which attempts to quantify these direct
and indirect effects of products and processes.
LCA has the potential to have a significant impact on determining
the true ``greenness'' of a material. Standards organizations such as
the American Society of Testing and Materials (ASTM) and the
International Standards Organization (ISO) have worked to develop
consistent LCA methods and procedures in order to quantify
environmental impacts. Notwithstanding these efforts, LCA continues to
receive both positive and negative comment on its utility as a process
to evaluate environmental impact. Part of the difficulty rests in the
inability to define a common methodology to determine the life cycle
environmental cost of a material. Another difficulty lies in locating
reliable data on the performance of the material and the associated
maintenance costs that occur over time. Indeed, despite all the
activity in standards organizations and elsewhere, there is still
debate within the LCA practitioner community as to whether a scientific
basis exists for applying impact assessment techniques to the data
derived from an LCA process analysis. Nonetheless, many standards LCA
processes demonstrate that concrete's thermal mass, combined with an
optimal amount of insulation, saves energy over the life of a building,
thus reducing energy consumption in the building sector which accounts
over 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels. However,
NRMCA is not aware of any rigorous applications of LCA pavements to
concrete pavements, pervious or otherwise.
However, environmental friendliness can be reasonably well
determined through analysis and some level of reliance on existing
green building rating systems such as the U.S. Green Building Council's
LEED rating system, the Green Building Initiative's Green Globes
program, or by EPA's Energy Star system. As it relates to general
building, it could be noted that the U.S. General Services
Administration and the Department of Defense (among other federal
entities) have produced statements perceived as favorable toward LEED
in particular. The basic focus areas of the LEED, Green Globes, and
similar programs seem to be much the same. There is consistent emphasis
on ``Sustainable Sites,'' ``Water Efficiency,'' Energy and Atmosphere''
and ``Indoor Environmental Quality.''
It an open question as to whether LEED, Green Globes, or Energy
Star are really suited to meet the needs of green pavement
technologies. In this respect, leading members of the green community
have concluded that the answer to the question of what is
environmentally friendly is most apparent when actual use is
considered. In the case of pervious concrete among the reasons it can
be considered environmentally friendly is because it provides an
effective means of improving overall water quality, it offers
substantial support to Low Impact Development, it is included among the
EPA's Recommended Best Management Practices as an element of stormwater
management on a local/regional basis, and green building rating systems
such as LEED and Green Globes clearly allow it to contribute to the
credits registered projects can accumulate for certification.
BARRIERS TO BUILDING GREEN
The barriers to the acceptance and utilization of both established
and developing environmental technologies by private enterprise are
many. While the improved public relations opportunities and other
values associated with green building are increasingly of interest,
off-setting the perceived increases in first costs are still greatly at
issue. Owners and their consultants are frequently challenged in their
awareness of green building technologies. While organizations like the
EPA are working to educate designers and builders, the lack of
understanding by various agencies and especially at the local and State
levels does not encourage the process. It is not that agencies and
regulators are so often taking a position that overtly denies the
utilization of a technology like pervious concrete, or LID for that
matter, it is more likely that their Best Management Practices (BMPs)
just don't address such.
NRMCA has a National Accounts program which I direct on a national
basis and includes a team of technical/promotional professionals who
operate primarily from various regional bases and are focused
accordingly. Our mission is to provide technology transfer relative to
the use of concrete to the entities both public and private that have
the opportunity to influence the selection of particular building
materials. Though primarily focused on private enterprise we attempt to
cover the bases with federal agencies as well. Among the largest
facilities owners we have established relationships with are the big
box builders and the largest commercial developers otherwise, and a
large number of consultant organizations to those builders and
developers.
A challenge for us comes in the ability to gain acceptance of a
technology like pervious concrete and other technologies such as
insulating concrete wall systems that have the potential to save as
much as 35 percent in the cost of heating/cooling a home. While
regulations and codes that simply do not address pervious concrete
technology are certainly barriers to acceptance, some of the challenge
is simply ``human.'' When presented with an unfamiliar LID technology,
the difficulty that some people have with pervious concrete is not that
it is LID, but that it is not an existing, established convention. The
relatively simple concept of allowing moisture to fall to Earth, pass
immediately through the filtration process pervious concrete provides
and then infiltrated in most applications without additional conveyance
and process is difficult for some to accept. That is not to say that
there cannot be legitimate concerns about various soils related
dynamics and other aspects of hydrology. However, numerous designers
and acknowledged experts in the field such as Bruce Ferguson, Franklin
Professor and former Director of the School of Environmental Design at
the University of Georgia, and author of the book, Porous Pavements,
suggests that it is usually within the capability of sound engineering
and hydrological design professionals to overcome many of those
perceived obstacles. Professor Ferguson goes on to say, ``The observed,
measured, documented, scientific fact is that properly designed,
installed, and maintained pervious concrete is structurally durable and
environmentally beneficial. Proven facts allow us to discard blindly
uniform convention, and to select the most appropriate technology for
each separate site-specific situation.''
FEDERAL INCENTIVES TO BUILD GREEN
Federal support to innovative building technologies can come
through a variety of means. States and local governments are proving
that modest tax credits can stimulate market interest in green building
practices by offsetting any additional up-front costs such as energy
modeling and commissioning. Tax credits should be tied to green
building technologies that deliver promised results and speed overall
market transformation. Such tax credits should apply to both the
commercial and residential markets.
Funding programs that are focused on increased awareness of
existing data, most of which is highly supportive of the technology
would not have to be very costly as perhaps the largest challenge is
the awareness and acceptance of existing data. Empirical data already
exists that is the result of research grants or was developed by a host
of universities and other researchers across the country. Much of this
data suffers from lack of circulation perhaps because it is generated
primarily by private enterprise. The American Concrete Institute's
Technical Committee--522--Pervious Concrete perhaps collates such data
more than anyone else, but communication of this technology may not
exist by any formal means to government agencies at any level. Federal
funding to insure such data is transferred on an appropriate basis and
broadly distributed would do much to move awareness of existing data
forward.
Funds specifically earmarked for agency personnel to attend
national, regional, and local programs that are increasingly available
on specific innovative technologies like pervious concrete would also
be highly beneficial. In the spring of 2006, a major national symposium
on pervious concrete took place in Nashville, TN, was sponsored by
NRMCA with a call for technical papers widely advertised. While the
private sector sent people from all parts of the country attendance by
agency personnel was limited. On an on-going basis, NRMCA sponsors
regional seminars (10 or more in 2007) charging moderate prices and are
presented by some of the top technologists in the industry. These would
be excellent venue for agency officials to pick-up existing technology
on pervious concrete.
Increased research grants and tax incentives for building that
would deploy targeted new technologies would be of huge benefit. A
positive model currently funded and under final development relates to
the cooperative effort and partnership between EPA's Region III and
NRMCA where strong leadership and support by Dominique Lueckenhoff,
Associate Director for Water Quality, has led to a research grant for
Villanova University to evaluate the water quality and other
capabilities of competing porous pavement systems, in this case,
pervious concrete and porous asphalt pavements. The grant funding has
come from EPA and assistance from the RMC Research and Education
Foundation.
Positive programs supportive of new technology also exist at the
State and local level that would be highly worthy of federal support.
One fine example of such relates to Snohomish County, Washington's goal
of implementing Low Impact Development. Snohomish County, WA, is one of
a very few, and the first in the State of Washington to do so. Ref:
Snohomish County Ordinance 06-044, adopted July, 2006. This ordinance
creates staff leeway to approve methods which they determine to meet
the County's storm water management goals, and provides incentives to
developers who use LID methods and materials. These incentives are in
the form of expedited permit processing, which results in real monetary
incentive to the developer, who gets to shorten his development period,
and get properties to market sooner. A technology like pervious
concrete has a much better opportunity to be utilized in this
environment and meets the environmental goals of a highly
environmentally sensitive area such as the Puget Sound Area of
Washington.
NRMCA appreciates the opportunity to present this statement for the
record.
Biography for Daniel J. Huffman
Based in Portland, Oregon, Dan is the Managing Director of National
Resources for the National Ready Mixed Concrete Assn. (NRMCA) a Silver
Spring, MD, headquartered non-profit national trade association. For
more than 25 years he has worked throughout the west and nationally
with owners, designers, contractors, and concrete producers while
employed by various concrete materials companies including those
producing ready mixed concrete and aggregate, concrete paving, portland
cement, fly ash pozzolan, and various admixtures for the modification
of concrete.
Dan is a member of the American Concrete Institute's (ACI) Board
Advisory Committee on Sustainable Development, and is a voting member
of ACI's technical committees on ``Pervious Concrete'' and ``Design &
Construction with Insulating Concrete Forms.'' Most of Dan's focus is
now on technology transfer relating to sustainable construction and the
potential for advancement of ``green building with concrete''
technologies--and a national team of Resource Directors employed by
NRMCA in every region of the country report to Dan.
Chairman Wu. Thank you, Mr. Huffman. Mr. Kassoff, welcome
to the Committee.
STATEMENT OF MR. HAL KASSOFF, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT, PARSONS BRINCKERHOFF
Mr. Kassoff. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Subcommittee. My name is Hal Kassoff, with PB, Parsons
Brinckerhoff, a global engineering consulting firm, and I also
served for 12 years as State Highway Administrator in the State
of Maryland. I very much appreciate the opportunity to be here.
Five years ago, while with PB, I was asked by a colleague,
who was leading a company-wide sustainability initiative for
buildings and transportation, whether I thought the case could
be made for highways as a net contributor, rather than a net
detractor, in terms of sustainable development. I took on the
assignment, and began researching, writing, and speaking about
what I called Sustainable Highways: Oxymoron or Opportunity.
I define sustainable highways as improvements which achieve
better than before outcomes, not only for highway purposes,
such as safety, mobility, and structural integrity, but also
for broader environmental and societal goals.
While not as advanced in sustainable development as
buildings, and not as inherently sustainable as public
transportation, there are several underlying reasons why the
concept of sustainable highways is an idea whose time has come.
The first is that an increasingly demanding and politically
active customer base, the people we serve, want improved
transportation and a healthy environment. They are not willing
to sacrifice one for the other.
Second is that over 90 percent of highway improvements are
on existing, rather than new facilities, a radical change from
the recent era of interstate highway construction. This offers
a unique opportunity to improve communities and the environment
by virtue of a second generation of highway projects that must
adhere to much more stringent requirements, such as for air
quality, noise, wetlands, water quality, endangered species,
historic preservation, just to name a few.
The third factor is that for the past seven or eight years,
AASHTO, the American Association of State Highway and
Transportation Officials, has advanced the concept of
environmental stewardship, accepting responsibility for the
environment as affected by transportation improvements. Perhaps
even more importantly, seeking practical and affordable ways to
enhance it. By actively approaching and promoting an approach
to project development called context sensitive solutions,
AASHTO provides the single most important tool to fulfill
environmental stewardship and sustainability goals. And more
recently, AASHTO initiated a process to define and advance a
vision for sustainable transportation throughout this country,
with the assistance of a national panel of professionals, which
I had the privilege and honor of chairing.
A fourth factor is that sustainable highways makes good
business and good economic sense from several perspectives. On
a project level, they contribute to economic efficiency, since
context sensitive and sustainable highway improvements are more
likely to be supported and implemented much faster than less
contextual and less sustainable alternatives, which are more
likely to languish. Also, from a life cycle asset management
perspective, investing in increased durability and preventive
maintenance means lower life cycle costs, less consumption of
nonrenewable resources, and reduced economic losses to shippers
and travels, who are delayed less frequently by repairs and
reconstruction. And let us not forget the role of highways in
an ever expanding recycling industry, which is second to none.
There are many opportunities for sustainable highway
practices, from the earliest phases of planning, where land use
and conservation and transportation decisions can be better
coordinated, as encouraged by SAFETEA-LU legislation, to
technologies for fast track construction, managing traffic, and
reducing impacts during and after construction. These
opportunities are articulated in a series of tools, with which
we were associated, including a compendium of environmental
stewardship practices in construction and maintenance, and a
30-page highway sustainability checklist, which covers planning
all the way to operations. These opportunities are underscored
by the cooperative Green Highways Partnership that you have
already heard about from EPA and Federal Highways.
Perhaps the greatest barrier to sustainable highways lies
with motor vehicles that use these highways, and in particular,
the carbon footprint and related air quality and climate change
issues that arise. A sustainable highways concept that ignores
motor vehicle issues represents just part of the puzzle.
The second barrier has to do with the land use decisions
that can exploit and ultimately degrade highway service and the
quality of life through strip development and sprawl, problems,
by the way, that Portland, Oregon is noted for having overcome
in your home district, and I congratulate Portland in that
regard.
Finally, as a way to simultaneously induce, as well as
measure sustainability outcomes in infrastructure, we can apply
a framework known throughout the world of sustainable
development. Mostly outside the United States, as the Triple
Bottom Line, a framework to set targets, measure progress, and
evaluate whether and to what extent the so-called better than
before outcomes are indeed achieved as we pursue a robust
economy, a healthy natural environment, and an enhanced quality
of life, which we all certainly want. The Triple Bottom Line
has the potential to offer incentives and inducements to public
as well as private sector decision-makers to pursue
sustainability strategies and initiatives without mandating the
details of how to achieve these desired outcomes. I would
strongly recommend research into the best ways to apply this
Triple Bottom Line tool in the United States.
In sum, the goal of sustainable highways may, at first,
sound like an oxymoron, but in reality, represents an
opportunity whose time has come. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Kassoff follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hal Kassoff
Sustainable Highways: Oxymoron or Opportunity
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee, my name is Hal Kassoff.
I am a Senior Vice President and Highway Market Leader with PB, a
global infrastructure consulting firm with 200 offices worldwide. Thank
you for the opportunity to share these thoughts with you today.
Five years ago I was asked by a colleague who was leading a
company-wide sustainability initiative for buildings and transportation
whether I thought the case could be made for highways as a net
contributor rather than a net detractor in terms of sustainable
development. I took on the assignment and began researching, writing
and speaking about what I called ``Sustainable Highways: Oxymoron or
Opportunity.''
I define sustainable highways as improvements which achieve
``better than before'' outcomes, not only for highway purposes such as
safety, mobility and structural integrity, but also for broader
environmental and societal goals.
While not as advanced in sustainable development as buildings, and
not as inherently sustainable as public transportation, there are
several underlying reasons why the concept of sustainable highways is
an idea whose time has come.
1) The first is that an increasingly demanding and politically
active customer base is expecting more of us. Our customers
want improved transportation and a healthy environment. They
are not willing to sacrifice one for the other.
2) Second is that over 90 percent of highway improvements are
on existing rather than new facilities--a radical change from
the recent era of Interstate highway construction. This offers
a unique opportunity to improve communities and the environment
by virtue of a second generation of highway projects that must
adhere to more stringent requirements, such as for air quality,
noise, wetlands, water quality, endangered species, and
historic preservation, to name just a few.
3) The third factor is that for the past seven or eight years,
AASHTO (the American Association of State Highway and
Transportation Officials) has advanced the concept of
environmental stewardship--accepting responsibility for the
environment as affected by transportation improvements, and
seeking practical and affordable ways to enhance it. By
actively promoting an approach to project development called
Context Sensitive Solutions, AASHTO provides the single most
important tool to fulfill environmental stewardship and
sustainability goals. And more recently, AASHTO initiated a
process to define and advance a vision for sustainable
transportation with the assistance of a diverse panel of
professionals which I have had the honor of chairing.
4) A fourth factor is that sustainable highways make good
business and economic sense from several perspectives. On a
project level, they can contribute to economic efficiency in
that context sensitive, sustainable highway improvements are
more likely to be supported and implemented than less
contextual and less sustainable alternatives which are more
likely to languish in controversy. Also, from a life cycle
asset management perspective, investing in increased durability
and preventive maintenance means lower life cycle costs,
consumption of fewer non-renewable resources, and reduced
economic losses to shippers and travelers delayed by less
frequent repair and reconstruction cycles. And, it should not
be overlooked, the role of highways in an ever expanding
recycling industry is becoming second to none.
Opportunities for sustainable highway practices abound, from the
earliest phases of planning where land use, conservation, and
transportation decisions can be better coordinated, as encouraged by
SAFETEA-LU, to construction, maintenance and operations where new
technologies for fast-track construction, managing traffic, reducing
noise, controlling emissions, and suppressing dust offer an array of
possibilities. These opportunities are articulated in a variety of
tools such as the Compendium of Environmental Stewardship Practices in
Construction and Maintenance to a 30-page highway sustainability
checklist from planning to operations--in both of which I am proud to
say PB, and I personally, have been involved.\1\ They are evidenced by
the cooperative Green Highways Partnership advanced by EPA and FHWA as
well as several State DOTs.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ The referenced compendium is a research report under the
National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP 25-25 (4) ) and
can be found on the website of AASHTO's Center for Environmental
Excellence at: http://environment.transportation.org/
environmental-issues/
construct-maint-prac/compendium/manual/ The
referenced checklist was developed by PB and recognized by AASHTO in
its 2007 National Competition Award for Transportation Professionalism.
The checklist may be accessed by contacting Hal Kassoff at
[email protected]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Clearly the state-of-the-art is advancing at a rapid pace as
demands for kinder and gentler infrastructure projects increasingly
prevail.
Perhaps the greatest barrier to sustainable highways lies with the
motor vehicles that use them and in particular, the carbon foot print
and related air quality and climate change issues that arise. A
sustainable highways concept that ignores motor vehicle issues
represents just part of the puzzle.
A second barrier involves land use decisions that exploit and
ultimately degrade highway service and quality of life through strip
development and sprawl that discourage walking and use of alternative
modes. Land use planning, zoning and utility location decisions must be
made in conjunction with transportation to shape a more coherent and
sustainable approach to growth.
Finally, as a way to simultaneously induce as well as measure
sustainability outcomes we can apply a framework known throughout the
world of sustainable development (mostly outside the United States) as
the ``Triple Bottom Line''--a framework to set targets, measure
progress, and evaluate whether and to what extent better than before
outcomes are indeed achieved as we pursue a robust economy, a healthy
natural environment, and an enhanced quality of life. The triple bottom
line has the potential to offer incentives and inducements to public as
well as private sector decision-makers to pursue sustainability
strategies and initiatives without mandating the details of how to
achieve desired outcomes. I would strongly recommend research into the
best ways to apply this tool in the United States.
In sum the goal of sustainable highways may at first sound like an
oxymoron, but in reality represents an opportunity whose time has come.
Biography for Hal Kassoff
Hal Kassoff is a Senior Vice President with PB responsible for
providing leadership in emerging highway-related practice areas. Mr.
Kassoff has guided the development of a workshop on Sustainable
Highways which he has delivered to clients and PB professionals
worldwide. He also led the team that produced the NCHRP Compendium of
Environmental Stewardship Practices in Construction and Maintenance,
and was recognized by AASHTO with an award for developing a Highway
Sustainability Checklist. Mr. Kassoff led a team that produced PB's
reference guide for Concepts in Contextual Highway Design as well as a
training seminar in Context Sensitive Solutions.
Prior to joining PB, Hal spent 25 years with the Maryland
Department of Transportation, including six years as Director of
Planning and Preliminary Engineering and 12 years as State Highway
Administrator. During Hal's tenure, the Environmental Design Division
was established and SHA was recognized for its aesthetic and
environmentally sensitive bridges and highway designs.
Hal has been a frequent speaker and has published a number of
articles on Context Sensitive Solutions and Sustainable Highways.
Discussion
Chairman Wu. Thank you very much, Mr. Kassoff. Now comes
the time for questions, and the Chair recognizes himself for
five minutes.
Commissioner Adams, you mentioned that there are several
challenges faced by the City of Portland in implementing its
green streets initiative, and I would like you to line out, or
lay out for us what some of those challenges are, how the green
streets initiative would interact with existing stormwater
management systems, and that if the green streets initiative
could have been fully implemented, what the impact would have
been on stormwater runoff, both in terms of costs and
effectiveness.
Mr. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Chair, Members of the Committee.
Starting in 1994, and for a series of years, including up to
the last years that I have been Commissioner in charge of
transportation and environmental services, we have sought
partnerships with the EPA on a number of green stormwater-
related projects, and indeed, we have achieved some of those
partnerships with EPA. But I would personally characterize the
partnerships as, the green transportation partnerships as, in
addition to the normal requirements of the grey pipe solutions.
So, for instance, our sewer retrofit, which is a $1.4
billion digging up of the sewers, big pipes, and everything
else, when we asked them to supplement some of that grey pipe
solution for some green stormwater solutions, they said no, and
in fact, used that as the impetus, one of the impetuses for a
six year investigation of the City that is still open and
ongoing today. So, there are parts of EPA that I find to be
very interested in the partnerships around green stormwater,
especially related to streets, and there are other parts of the
Agency where we have experienced quite the opposite.
I understand the reluctance to put too much reliance on
green stormwater solutions that don't have, you know, the stamp
of approval of the EPA, but I would hope that the most recent
good words that we have heard from the EPA on green stormwater
would have happened sooner.
Chairman Wu. Thank you. You referred in your testimony to
an unclear regulatory environment, and that there might be a
long series of steps, so that more municipalities or local
jurisdictions would enact green streets approaches to
stormwater. What are some of the steps that you think are
necessary, and what are some of the clarifications, from a
regulatory perspective, that you think are necessary to promote
green technologies in stormwater treatment?
Mr. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Chair, Members of the Committee.
I think one key issue is, to get to those standards, is to
support a national program of research and development around
green infrastructure technology and specifically around green
transportation stormwater technologies. A national technology
development program, I think, builds on the EPA's recent green
infrastructure statement of intent, and your Congressional
statement of support for green infrastructure.
Local governments, again, need to know what the measures of
success are. Mr. Grumbles talked about we are not going. The
EPA is not going to dictate the solutions, but we need to know,
you know, what the measures of success are, the results that
they are looking for, and projects that we can then go after.
The other is that the specific green transportation
stormwater tools for Portland should and will be different than
the same tools in other parts of the United States that have
different terrains, different climates, different weather
patterns. So, as--if the EPA would help work with local
governments and State governments to develop some standards and
approaches, they need to, in my opinion, they need to do it
based on the different kinds of terrains that exist in the
United States.
The other is, as mentioned by my fellow witnesses up here,
and this is to really put some rigor to the costs and benefits
around the green transportation technology. We would welcome
that. We are seeing savings, and there are parts of our city,
like a lot of the cities around the United States, where the
existing sewer infrastructure, the pipes are too small, or
where there is new development, or an expansion of the city,
where new pipes have to be laid. What we are experiencing is
significant savings by not having to go in and put in bigger
pipes, but implement green stormwater solutions, that keep the
stormwaters out of the pipe; therefore, we don't have to dig
them, and we realize significant savings in terms of where the
city is expanding and not having to put the pipes in under the
street in the first place to deal with that stormwater runoff
from the streets saves money for everybody.
Again, we want to feel assured that what we are doing is
going to meet with EPA's approval in the future. So, those
standards, I think, are really key, and agreement among the
Federal, State, and local governments around some cross benefit
methodologies would be incredibly useful.
Chairman Wu. Thank you, Commissioner. My time has expired,
but at some point in the future, if there are records of, or
estimates of what potential cost savings might be achieved, the
Committee would be very, very interested in that information.
And with that, I turn to the Ranking Member, Dr. Gingrey.
Mr. Gingrey. Mr. Chairman, thank you. We touched on this a
little bit before we had to break for votes, but this is, of
course, extremely, extremely interesting testimony.
And I think my question before was, pertained to best
management practices, depending on the environment, and where
you are, and how much rainfall, but not just the total quantity
per year. I am not really sure that Oregon gets that much more,
maybe Georgia has average rainfall is closer to 50 inches per
year. So, it is more, I think you said 37 for Oregon. But it
comes in a different way. I am sure we get a lot more
thunderstorms, and you get a lot more gentle, steady rain that
everybody likes, and likes to hear at night, particularly, if
you have got a tin roof on your house. But Florida and Georgia
are a little bit different.
And so, I guess the point, and any one of the three of you
can address this, because Mr. Huffman, obviously, is in the
business, and Mr. Kassoff, in his testimony, is very
knowledgeable about this as well, different strokes for
different folks, I guess is what I am talking about. I know we
were recently in Hamburg, Germany, looking at all these
windmills, and the discussion was well, you know, this is
great, and this is the Germans talking, German scientists, in
regard to renewable energy sources, and they said well, these
windmills are great up here in Hamburg on the North Sea, but
they wouldn't do a whole lot of good on the equator, whereas
the solar panels would probably be very, very efficient on the
equator, but those windmills wouldn't get you a lot of bang for
the buck.
So, it is this issue of best management practices,
depending on where you are, and clearly, one size will not fit
all, and if the Federal Government, and our two previous
witnesses, Ms. Shepherd and Mr. Grumbles, of course, of the EPA
and the Federal Highway Department, the bureaucracy tends to
want to try to squeeze a one size fits all mantra.
Talk about that for us a little bit, and how we can
approach it, and Mr. Huffman in particular, the pervious
concrete, I think, is very interesting, the pictures or the
slides that you showed, extremely interesting, and how, what
does that do to the strength of the concrete, you know, over
the old, traditional, rock solid concrete with rebars and all
that stuff, and I am looking at something I have never seen
before. Maybe you could explain that to us, and whether or not
that would be applicable, also, to asphalt surfaces.
Mr. Huffman. Thank you, Ranking Member Gingrey, and Members
of the Committee.
As it relates to concrete and the one size fits all, the
bigger product area that is sometimes cast upon us relates to
porous pavements generally, and within that, there is certainly
a difference between pervious concrete and some other porous or
pervious materials. For example, pervious concrete, like its
counterpart on the asphalt side of the industry, takes large
stone and sand from our conventional technologies of
conventional concrete, that is also used with Portland cement
binder, which provides a very rigid binding material. We take
the sand out, and we create a void structure. The competing
material, which is a petroleum-based product, which is
frequently referred to by highway engineers as flexible
pavement, uses asphalt as a binder. They have large rocks in
their conventional product, and they also take the sand out, so
basically, the products are much the same in terms of larger
rocks and a binder, with little or no sand.
The benefits of concrete in that situation, especially, to
be distinguished from a competing material, is that the rigid
binder is ideally situated, or positioned, to allow for a
voided product, with 15 to 30 percent void factors, and stays
rigid. In respect to your question about strength, yes, it is
true, as we take the voids out, and allow for decreased
density, the product does lose some compressive strength. We
compensate for that by increasing the depth of the structure,
typically by about a 50 percent factor. So in a parking lot,
for example, typically, a conventional concrete parking lot is
four inches in thickness, and with pervious concrete, because
of the decreased density, we increase the thickness to six
inches. So, that is the way the technology works.
Mr. Gingrey. Is it cheaper, and I am not sure exactly how
you measure it and how you price it, but is it more expensive,
and I am assuming the answer is yes, to put in your product for
the long-term benefit? A lot of times, you have got developers
who are developing strip shopping centers and that sort of
thing, and the cost is obviously a factor. Do you get
resistance from that?
Mr. Huffman. We get resistance because in first costs,
certainly, the use of a product like pervious concrete, versus
a conventional pavement material, is going to be somewhat
higher. The offset, that it greatly advantages the environment
and the concept of using this, is that because we will
eliminate conventional stormwater detention on most
applications, such as parking lots, we will actually save in
the first costs of construction when we use a material like
this. For that reason, many big box builders and major shopping
mall developers, anybody building big parking lots, see this
very favorably.
Mr. Kassoff. Ranking Member Gingrey, I would like to
address your point about the one size fits all issue, in terms
of how the government might approach this issue of
sustainability and sustainable highways.
First, I think we have all learned over the years that
specifying outcomes, desired end results, and then, leaving
flexibility to other parties, states, local governments,
private industry, to figure out how to achieve those outcomes,
works better than specifying detailed methods, because we are
such a diverse country, and what works in one place doesn't
necessarily work in another.
And then, extending that idea, and we have given an awful
lot of thought to this idea, of whether you could legislate or
regulate sustainability into effect. In the highway business,
and I sense that you have some familiarity with how that works,
you can call your commissioner, Former President of AASHTO by
the way, and one of the leading transportation officials in the
country.
The principle that has been established for the past 20 to
30 years under NEPA. NEPA is actually older than that, but what
had evolved is this idea that when impacts are created by
transportation facilities, the first order is try to avoid
them, the second is to try to minimize them, and the third is
with whatever impacts are minimally necessary, you must
mitigate those impacts, which means a restoration idea. And it
engenders an avoidance of harm, and then, a compensation for
harm by trying to draw even through mitigation. What
sustainability, and that, by the way, has found its way into
regulation, and it is appropriate, if we--I like to use the
term, if we create a mess, our obligation is to clean it up and
fix it.
There are serious questions whether that approach alone
will move us towards sustainability, especially since we have
started with, as you pointed out, some damage to the
environment, just by the works we have accomplished over the
years. We are very proud of these works, but there have been
these unavoidable impacts.
The sustainability idea, founded on environmental
stewardship, which is better than before, transforms the
mentality from avoiding a negatives approach into a create
positives. And the create positives approach, I think, can come
about through, more likely to come about through, a series of
initiatives and steps that the Federal Government can take,
other than regulation and hard legislation. It could be
incentivized, for example. It can be recognized that as the
Mid-Atlantic Region EPA Region has demonstrated through their
green highways initiative, that through cooperation they are
much more likely to achieve a faster turnaround and a better
end result than by just riding the minimums.
So, I think what we are looking for is performance outcomes
rather than methods. In the first instance, a level playing
field for minimum requirements to avoid, minimize, mitigate,
and then, an incentivization through articulation of principles
and policies, right down to some form of recognition that by
going the extra step, there are benefits to be achieved.
Mr. Gingrey. Thank you. Thank all of you.
Chairman Wu. I would like to recognize Dr. Ehlers for five
minutes.
Mr. Ehlers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I have to say it
really warms my heart to hear the testimony. Many years ago,
when I was a county commissioner, I also chaired the County
Board of Public Works, and tried to introduce the ideas of
sustainability in a number of ways, met tremendous resistance,
particularly from the engineers, who said you know, just
another do-gooder trying to mess up our profession.
Fortunately, I am a physicist, so I could tend to argue them
down sometimes, but not all the time.
And also, Mr. Chairman, I have to note, since I am a
scientist, I always try to correlate data I observe, and I have
noticed something amazing about this committee. A very
disproportionate number of the witnesses tend to come from
Portland, Oregon.
Chairman Wu. It is means as a forward thinking.
Mr. Ehlers. Yeah. I am having trouble--I haven't quite
determined the correlation yet, but I will figure it out.
I just want to comment, the examples you have given are
primarily from Portland, and Mr. Gingrey talked about Georgia
and so forth, but what about the frozen North? Michigan has a
particular problem, and I am from Michigan. We are even worse
off than Minnesota and Wisconsin, which are to the west,
because there, it freezes and it stays frozen for four months,
and then thaws. In Michigan, it freezes and thaws every couple
of weeks. We have an incredible amount of freeze-thaw cycle,
which really weakens our systems, and leads to a lot of
maintenance problems.
How does pervious material work in a constant freeze-thaw
cycle? And in particular, if you have a roadway get a lot of
water in, it freezes very hard at night, and may stay that way
for several days, what does that do to the permeable surface,
or the pervious surface, I should say? Any comments?
Mr. Huffman. I definitely have a comment, Congressman
Ehlers, and Members of the Committee, thank you.
The American Concrete Institute and other organizations
have done extensive studies to determine the freeze-thaw
durability of previous concrete, in particular, and we have
mostly empirical data, but there are laboratories at
universities across the country that are evaluating it also
under laboratory conditions. And their findings are very
supportive of its use for freeze-thaw durability climates.
I can assure you that before major big box builders went in
to a city like Denver, which they claim to have more cycling
than anybody in the country, but there are some other places
that would make the same claim, they looked very carefully at
this technology, and with their consultants, they determined
that the data that we presented was sufficient, and it is being
well proven in the field in a number of, in all applications
that we know of, and after probably more than ten years at
various locations around the country, we are not aware of any
suspected deterioration anywhere due to freeze-thaw cycling
with pervious concrete.
Mr. Ehlers. Up in Eastern Michigan?
Mr. Huffman. I think on a very limited basis, that would be
driveways and sidewalks and such, nothing that would be a well
documented commercial application.
Mr. Ehlers. I would be very interested to see. Denver, in
spite of the fact they claim everything, certainly has big
swings in the freeze-thaw cycle, but they have far less
frequent freeze-thaw cycles than the Upper Midwest does, so
well, when you find some data, or you find some people in
Michigan, I would be very interested, if you encounter that
some time in the future.
Mr. Huffman. Yes, sir.
Mr. Ehlers. With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman Wu. Thank you. Mr. Huffman, let me follow up on
that research, or research and development question, and with
respect to high traffic or high use areas. Are there further
areas of research that are necessary before permeable pavements
are used? The examples that you showed earlier are very
impressive, but those tend to be in parking lot settings. What
about high use environments like highways?
Mr. Huffman. Yeah. You are absolutely right. There isn't
yet enough data to support the use in highway applications, in
particular. It is the speed of traffic, it is not necessarily
the loads that are carried in terms of 18 wheelers and such. We
have actually been able to handle those loads in parking lot
applications well with pervious concrete. But more study is
definitely required relative to highways.
Chairman Wu. Thank you. And Mr. Huffman and Mr. Kassoff,
are there some challenges in acceptance of this technology by
buildings and, you know, the construction industry? Are there
further steps that need to be taken, either in the public or
private sector, for faster takedown of these technologies?
Mr. Kassoff. The national organization that all of the
State Departments of Transportation belong to, AASHTO, we have
mentioned it several times, has a national testing program.
Each state has its own laboratories, but they have a more
efficient, integrated approach in recent years for industry to
bring products for testing and evaluation, and I think as,
again, we look for outcomes and we leave industry with
flexibility, the need for those testing programs is even
greater. The mechanisms are definitely there.
There is no question that more research into the hard
technology is needed, as well as the application of the
institutional framework of Triple Bottom Line that we mentioned
earlier. But yes, that would all contribute to advancing
sustainability in infrastructure more rapidly.
Mr. Huffman. Chairman Wu, thank you. I would like to add
that the major owners in private enterprise are generally
supportive of this technology, and what happens is when they
move down to the regional and local level, they very often are
faced with regulators who just are not yet aware of the
technology, in spite of the fact that it is an EPA best
management practice for first-flush pollution mitigation, and
the EPA is very supportive. Many of these agencies don't have
BMPs relating to low impact development, much less pervious
concrete, and as they transition in that direction, we will
expect that they will find the means to become knowledgeable
enough to be positively responsive.
Chairman Wu. So, that local level of regulation is also
very important in the takedown of this technology.
Mr. Huffman. Absolutely, sir.
Mr. Kassoff. And I would just add, that in addition to
regulation, I think part of what Mr. Huffman is talking about,
and I would second, is education. It is a broadening of the
horizons of what is possible, so that the engineers that
Congressman Ehlers encountered in the future are engineers who
are seeking out these alternatives and have places to go for
referents to find that they do work.
Chairman Wu. Commissioner Adams, you showed me some
residential developments, which were truly outstanding, and the
thoughtfulness with which they planned out the disposition and
the flows of groundwater. Some developers do that, some
developers don't do that. What are some of the factors that go
into that private sector developer decision, and what can we do
to encourage more residential development that uses green
street concepts?
Mr. Adams. Thank you Mr. Chair. I think we in the local
level in Portland, as I touched on earlier, have been first
doing our own research and development, so that we can prove to
ourselves and the private sector that the green stormwater
approach works, whether it is on the public right of way or on
the private side.
We also regulate. We have a stormwater development manual
that, for new construction, establishes that minimum amount of
a minimum green stormwater approach to new development or major
renovation of existing buildings. But then, we also try to--we
don't like to rely just on regulations. Our preference is to be
partners with the private sector, because it can be a win-win.
When a developer develops in a manner that takes existing
stormwater off the system, that saves us money. In the short-
term it saves us money because many of our pipes are 80, 90
years old, and therefore, inadequate or too small to handle the
increased density of the City of Portland. We will also partner
with developers by paying them a portion of the cost to do a
green stormwater development or treatment of their parking lots
and of the development that they are looking at, because we
actually make it back in savings over a very defined and a
pretty quick period of time.
So, in some ways we have actuarial sort of experience now
with how much we can incent the private sector to do the right
thing, and when we will get, when the ratepayers, the city's
ratepayers for the sewer agency actually will get that benefit
back.
Chairman Wu. Thank you very much. Dr. Ehlers, further
questions.
Mr. Ehlers. Just a follow up, and then, I think we will all
be wrapped up here.
Mr. Kassoff, you have gotten off relatively free so far. I
just wanted to pick your brain about, since you have a lot of
background in State DOTs and AASHTO. I would like some idea
from about, first of all, what kind of barriers do you run into
when advocating these new approaches? Can you also tell the
Committee about how these group efforts that we are talking
about here play into the green highway R&D and implementation
efforts?
Mr. Kassoff. I think the principal barrier is one of lack
of awareness and, in some cases, leadership. When we have
leadership that says we are going to be green, and we are
moving in the direction of sustainability, and we are going to
challenge you, the engineers in our agency, to come up with
different ways to achieve that, the juices start flowing.
Actually, people move out of their comfort zone and create
solutions.
And we have seen this in case after case. Oregon is a State
that is a leader in this regard, as is Washington State, New
York, and my home State of Maryland. So, it is very much a
cultural and leadership type of issue. And it is a matter of
comfort zone. It is a matter of where the central tendency is,
as a physician, and you, as a physicist I should say, you
understand that. If the central tendency is to just repeat what
you have been doing in the past in your comfort zone, that is
where you remain, but if the central tendency, because it is
part of the organization's culture, is to experiment, to try to
fulfill a broader purpose, such as sustainability outcomes, or
green outcomes, then that is the way the engineers will want to
move.
Engineers are problem-solvers, and I think they thrive on
challenges. Just going back to the same old manuals and the
same old practices, which don't achieve these new expectations,
is not the height of engineering to most professionals.
Mr. Ehlers. My personal experience, most of the opposition
came not so much from the engineers, once they understood what
was happening to the field, but from local government leaders,
who are afraid of headlines about this wonderful new project
that came in 25 percent over budget, et cetera, and that is the
big fear. And so, it tends to spread rather slowly, but the
best thing is to have success, present papers at national
conferences, the National Association of Counties, the
Municipal League, et cetera, and that then convinces them.
I have no further questions, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Wu. Well, I thank you for that comment, and I am
glad that Commissioner Adams has had a platform to talk about
some local successes. Unless Dr. Gingrey comes back from the
Floor in the next few minutes, or unless Dr. Ehlers has any
further questions, I only have one further inquiry, and that is
for Mr. Huffman and Mr. Kassoff.
What sources of federal support, if any, whether it is
grants or technical assistance, or other forms, have been of
assistance to you in developing green streets technology and
permeable pavement technology, and how can we adjust those
federal efforts to be best supportive? And Commissioner Adams,
if you want to take a shot at that also, you are very welcome
to.
Mr. Huffman. I am not sure where I have seen the benefit
directed directly from the funding, but what we do need, as Mr.
Kassoff said earlier, is that it needs to focused on education,
and the primary barrier is just that people don't understand.
The regulators are not necessarily taking negative positions.
They are just not aware of the technology, and so, the
technology is unaddressed. So, for an owner making a proposal
for a project, he sees it as a challenge to the permitting
process to be allowed to use any new technology, and it is just
easier not to submit.
Mr. Kassoff. The Federal Highway Administration has a
number of sources, and I have to say that in recent years, they
have been in tune with this idea of environmental stewardship
and context sensitive solutions, both of which are key
components of what we are talking about here, green
infrastructure.
On the research end, they have supported research into this
area. On the educational end, they work with universities. They
have the Council of University Transportation Centers that they
offer grants to. We would like to see the universities picking
up more on what we call context sensitive solutions. Civil
engineering programs around the country have definitely moved
in the green direction, since someone as old as I am went to
civil engineering school. So that has been a positive
development. But this idea of contextual design, that the one
size does not fit all, and we have to achieve these sustainable
outcomes by applying our most creative engineering tools, that
is something that needs to be educated.
Finally, in the regular Federal Highway Program, the
Federal Highway Administration, through initiatives like the
Green Highway Partnership, is saying funding is available for
this kind of thing. The Green Highways Partnership has adopted
a pilot project, actually not 25 miles from where we are
sitting. It happens to be U.S. 301 in Southern Maryland. It is
a corridor in great need of some improvement and has now become
the testbed for green highways and Green Highways Partnership
to see if the State DOT, which in Maryland, has been extremely
progressive. The EPA, which has been a leader in this regard,
Federal Highways, who has put funding into this Green Highways
Partnership and has been very supportive, and local
governments, all in combination with the private sector, can
make it work.
So, we are keeping our fingers crossed that we will have a
successful outcome in that regard, but they have made their
funding available, and of course, there is not sufficient
funding overall to accomplish all of these objectives. That is
for sure.
Chairman Wu. Thank you, Mr. Kassoff, and Commissioner
Adams, you may have the last word, if you so choose.
Mr. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just to, I think,
reiterate some points that were touched on in your opening
comments, and that I sought to underscore in my testimony, and
as well, has been mentioned by the other witnesses.
The effort at green transportation infrastructure has
really been in a research and development phase, a piloting
phase, and that has been very necessary. What I hope happens is
that we go from there to the strategies and the investment to
make it as a way of doing business. In terms of local
governments, what they really need to see from the federal
regulators is very explicit green lights that this is not just
okay to experiment with, but this is okay to begin to have as
part of the way of doing business and managing the
transportation system.
Chairman Wu. Thank you very much, and I want to thank all
the witnesses for your testimony, and also, for your
forbearance with the interaction of the Committee schedule and
the Floor schedule.
The record will remain open for additional statements from
the Members and for questions and answers to any follow-up
questions the Committee may ask of the witnesses.
The witnesses are excused, and the hearing is now
adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 4:45 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
Appendix 1:
----------
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Gloria M. Shepherd, Associate Administrator, Office of
Planning, Environment, and Realty, Federal Highway
Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation
Questions submitted by Chairman David Wu
Q1. How does FHWA coordinate with the EPA to ensure that new
technologies fit into the existing regulatory framework for stormwater
management? Does FHWA provide testing and evaluation results that can
be used to demonstrate a technology's compliance with EPA's
performance-based standards? Do you coordinate with EPA to identify
research needs and information gaps?
A1. FHWA and EPA coordinate at the national level through initiatives,
such as the International Best Management Practices (BMPs) Database,
which contains carefully screened BMPs and information on the
appropriate circumstances for their use. We are working with a
coalition of organizations to fund and manage the database, providing
data analysis, and developing protocols for integrating low impact
development techniques into the database. The work is ongoing and the
database is currently accessible at the web site: http://
www.bmpdatabase.org.
At the State level, State departments of transportation (DOTs)
coordinate with State water quality agencies, as well as EPA regional
offices, to determine if newly developed technologies will meet
regulatory standards. FHWA and the State DOT, in consultation with
State and federal water quality regulators, determine if the technology
will be appropriate for use in a highway setting. Safety and
engineering considerations also help to determine whether a particular
technology is appropriate for use on a project. For example, many
current low-impact development technologies, such as rain gardens, may
be appropriate for low volume residential streets, but cannot safely
handle the requirements of stormwater removal for an urban highway.
FHWA coordinates research needs at the national level with EPA
through professional organizations, such as the Transportation Research
Board (TRB) and the National Cooperative Highway Research Program
(NCHRP). There are several studies done through NCHRP that are
coordinated with EPA. One report of such a study is ``Evaluation and
Best Management Practices for Highway Runoff Control, NCHRP 25-20(1).''
This report focuses on improving the scientific and technical knowledge
base for the selection of BMPs through a better understanding of BMP
performance and application. It documents the extensive research on the
characterization of stormwater BMPs and the factors that influence
runoff, such as land use practice, hydraulic characteristics, regional
factors, and performance evaluation. Another report is entitled ``State
Transportation Agency Strategies to Address NPDES Phase II
Requirements, NCHRP 25-25(16).'' This report looks at how State
transportation departments are addressing compliance with National
Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Phase II requirements.
The research looked at staffing and organizational structure throughout
the entire agency regarding NPDES Phase II compliance for construction
activities, as well as the stormwater management program, as regulated
under the Municipal Separate Stormwater Sewer System (MS4). The report
also examines inspection systems and environmental management systems,
as well as recent trends concerning enforcement and methods for
achieving compliance.
We also coordinate our proposed research initiatives under the
Surface Transportation Environment and Planning Cooperative Research
Program (STEP) with other federal agencies, including EPA. Research
comments from other federal agencies are given the highest priority in
establishing our STEP research goals. FHWA is working with EPA on the
Mid-Atlantic Green Highways Partnership and the Great Lakes Initiative,
both of which have a stormwater research and technology component. FHWA
also supports the work of the American Association of State Highway and
Transportation Officials' (AASHTO) Transportation Environmental
Research Ideas data base, which is a repository for ideas on needed
environmental research. We are encouraging other federal agencies,
including EPA, to contribute ideas to this data base.
Another way that we are coordinating with EPA is through the Eco-
Logical grant. FHWA currently has an open solicitation that will
provide $1,050,000 in grant funds to support pilot projects, which
exemplify integrated planning and ecosystem-based approaches to
developing transportation infrastructure. EPA will be participating in
the technical review of the pilot project proposals, along with FHWA
and representatives from other agencies that participated in writing
the publication entitled Eco-Logical: An Ecosystem Approach to
Developing Infrastructure Projects. It is anticipated that this joint
review will identify additional research gaps and will provide
incentive for other agencies to join FHWA in funding future Eco-Logical
grants.
Q2. Of the State Planning and Research program funding, how much is
spent specifically on green transportation infrastructure R&D? Does
FHWA work with states to help them identify potential research
opportunities in the field of green transportation infrastructure?
A2. Section 505 of title 23, United States Code, requires that States
set aside two percent of the apportionments they receive from the
Interstate Maintenance, National Highway System, Surface
Transportation, Highway Bridge, Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality
Improvement, Highway Safety Improvement Program, and Equity Bonus
programs for State planning and research (SP&R) activities. Of this
amount, states must allocate 25 percent for research, development, and
technology transfer activities relating to highway, public
transportation, and intermodal transportation systems.
States select research projects to be funded with SP&R funds to
address State and local needs. However, FHWA Division Office staffs
have a continuing relationship with State research staffs and may
provide advice and guidance as they develop the projects and carry out
their research program. FHWA encourages States to use some of their
SP&R funds to participate in national research efforts, such as
Transportation Research Board (TRB) workshops. In addition, FHWA also
has helped to bring States together to address regional research needs.
The Mid-Atlantic Green Highways Partnership (GHP) is one example of
such FHWA coordination.
State departments of transportation have used SP&R funds for
substantial research into environmental issues, including regional
stormwater issues and development of best management practices suitable
for the particular issues in that locality or state. At least 20 states
currently have active projects related to stormwater management. One
example of ongoing research related to stormwater at the State level is
an ``Investigation of Stormwater Quality Improvements Utilizing
Permeable Pavement and/or Porous Friction Courses,'' which is being
sponsored by the Texas DOT using SP&R funds. The Wisconsin Department
of Transportation is engaged in a cooperative research project with the
U.S. Geological Survey to evaluate stormwater treatment devices. The
Oregon Department of Transportation is funding a project to develop
water quality monitoring methods or testing protocols for different
types of water quality facilities. Also, the District of Columbia DOT
is also conducting an evaluation of best practices for the reduction of
transportation-related stormwater pollution in Washington, DC.
Q3. In your testimony, you discussed FHWA's Infrastructure Research
and Technology program, which supports R&D for innovative highway
technologies. For those technologies considered ``green,'' what
criteria did you use to determine that the technology is
environmentally friendly? How do life cycle environmental costs affect
whether a technology is considered ``green''? What do you consider to
be included in life cycle costs? What are FHWA's plans for future
research in this area?
A3. FHWA characterizes infrastructure technologies as environmentally
friendly, if the technology will mitigate environmental impacts or
contribute to environmental improvements. For example, FHWA considers
cantilever construction an environmentally friendly technology, because
it can reduce the amount of ground, water, and river bed disturbance,
as well as minimize noise, dust, and erosion. Cantilever construction
also can reduce construction time, which minimizes the environmental
impacts of a project.
Life cycle cost analysis compares the life cycle costs of two or
more alternatives for a project, enabling the lowest overall cost
alternative to be identified. Under life cycle cost analysis, selection
of a design alternative is not based solely on the lowest initial
costs, but also considers all the future costs (appropriately
discounted) over the project's usable life. Generally, the costs
associated with construction, rehabilitation, and maintenance
activities of each alternative being compared are identified,
monetized, and then discounted to their present value. Life cycle cost
analysis typically does not affect whether a particular technology is
considered green.
However, through the Highways for LIFE program, FHWA is seeking
ways to build highways and bridges faster and safer (both design and
construction), to improve quality, and to reduce costs. Decreasing the
time a project takes to construct, while using environmentally
sensitive methods and increasing the longevity of a section of highway
or bridge, means there should be fewer adverse impacts to the
environment resulting from construction or reconstruction work. In this
way, FHWA is promoting longer lasting technologies, which in turn can
reduce environmental impacts. Currently, there are 10 projects funded
under Highways for LIFE.
FHWA's infrastructure research and technology programs are
examining a number of technologies with potential positive
environmental benefits. For example, FHWA is studying numerous
technologies to optimize pavement performance and improve the quality
of system performance and surface characteristics that are likely to
reduce adverse environmental impacts. This research includes innovative
pavement technologies, long-term pavement performance, ``warm mix''
technologies, quieter pavement technology, and the use of recycled
materials in pavement. We also are assessing prefabricated technologies
and other accelerated construction technologies (such as cantilever
construction), which reduce environmental impacts by moving much of the
construction process to controlled environments and reducing the time
of construction. Research on reducing the frequency and duration of
construction work zones likely will have environmental benefits as
well.
Questions submitted by Representative Phil Gingrey
Q1. Can you describe FHWA's role in the Green Highway Partnership? How
did your agency get involved in this activity and what do you expect
your role to be in future years? Will FHWA request funding for this
partnership beyond the current fiscal year?
A1. FHWA is one of the original partners in the development of the Mid-
Atlantic Green Highways Partnership, along with Region 3 of the EPA.
FHWA provided the initial funding for the initiative. To date, we have
dedicated $825,000 to this effort, along with staff participation in
initial workshops and development of the concept. We also participate
on the sub-teams of recycling and reuse, stormwater, and conservation
planning. FHWA employees from both headquarters and Division Offices in
the Mid-Atlantic region are engaged in the Green Highways Partnership.
In 2004, EPA Region 3 and FHWA's Maryland Division Office began
discussions about hosting a regional forum on streamlining,
stewardship, and watershed protection. These discussions resulted in
June 2005 executive planning meeting in Philadelphia, PA, where 50
senior-level executives from the public and private sectors came
together to define and establish a vision for Green Highways. The
initial organizing efforts culminated with a Green Highways Forum held
on November 8-10, 2005, in College Park, MD. The forum brought together
several hundred federal, State, and local transportation and
environmental officials, as well as professionals from the private
sector and trade associations. A formal Green Highways Partnership
resulted from the forum.
FHWA expects to continue its co-leadership role in the Mid-Atlantic
Green Highways Partnership. Our goal is to evaluate if such a
partnership can improve both environmental review and project
timeframes. The ongoing Green Highways Partnership pilot project on
Maryland 301 should provide us with more information to determine if
better integrated planning, improved recycling and reuse, and the use
of the most current technologies on a project can lead to the
regulatory flexibility needed to make a partnership of this nature a
benefit to the transportation community, as well as to the environment.
If the Mid-Atlantic Green Highways Partnership provides such a benefit,
our future role may be to work with EPA to extend the partnership to
other regions.
FHWA intends to continue our financial and staff support of the
Mid-Atlantic Green Highways Partnership in FY08 through the Surface
Transportation Environment and Planning Cooperative Research Program
(STEP).
Q2. In his testimony, Mr. Kassoff urged federal officials to consider
how they might promote a focus on improving environmental quality
rather than mitigating potential damage. What incentives does FHWA have
in place for projects to improve overall environmental quality rather
than simply meet regulations meant to avoid harm?
A2. Environmental considerations beyond regulatory requirements are
reflected in transportation plans and projects based on the interests
of the community, coordination with environmental groups and State and
federal agencies, and input from the public. FHWA has made a
significant investment in programs to promote integrated planning and
context sensitive solutions to both avoid impacts to sensitive
resources and to design transportation facilities that are compatible
with the important resource and community needs in an area.
FHWA works to showcase important ecosystem-based mitigation and
enhancement projects through initiatives such as the Exemplary
Ecosystem Initiatives (EEI) program. FHWA currently has 43 designated
EEIs, with a goal of 50 EEIs for 2007. EEIs clearly demonstrate how an
ecosystem approach (e.g., watershed-based mitigation) will generate
benefits, such as greater predictability in transportation project
timelines, ability to address multiple project impacts in a
comprehensive manner, more effective habitat conservation, and
elimination of temporal loss of wetland and riparian areas. To be
designated as an EEI, the scope of the ecosystem initiative must be
clear with respect to:
the resources in question and the need for innovative
solutions to preserve and enhance them;
the overall goals, both from an ecosystem perspective
and a highway perspective, that were met by the solution; and
the methodology used to bring about the solution
(e.g., effective use of stakeholder involvement, innovative
partnerships, and funding mechanisms).
FHWA also sponsors the biennial Environmental Excellence Awards for
ecosystem-based mitigation and conservation. Additionally, FHWA is
funding the Eco-Logical pilot projects grant, the purpose of which is
to support pilot projects that exemplify integrated planning and
ecosystem-based approaches to developing transportation infrastructure.
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Benjamin H. Grumbles, Assistant Administrator for Water,
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Questions submitted by Chairman David Wu
Q1. How does EPA determine if a technology fits into the definition of
green transportation infrastructure? How do life cycle environmental
costs affect whether a technology is considered ``green''? What do you
consider to be included in the life cycle costs?
A1. ``Green Infrastructure'' is a relatively new and flexible term, and
has been used by various speakers and writers in various contexts. EPA
has recently defined green infrastructure as a way to protect surface
waters and drinking water supplies, reduce drinking water and
stormwater treatment costs, reduce urban heat island impacts, and
provide more sustainable water resource management.
Similarly, ``green transportation infrastructure'' is not yet a
defined term of art. However, EPA's Green Highways Partnership has
focused on projects that go beyond minimum standards set by
environmental laws and regulations and integrates transportation
functionality and ecological health to provide a net increase in
environmental functions and values of a watershed, while improving upon
sustainability for both the environment and transportation.
Green highways may employ a number of practices towards achieving
this outcome, including the use of permeable, low-impact practices that
provide high performance in reducing stormwater impacts, thus
preventing stream bed scouring, erosion and sedimentation and toxic
pollutant runoff into streams and rivers; construction with recycled
materials, thereby reducing landfill usage; and design using cutting-
edge technologies, such as wildlife corridors and strategic
conservation to protect critical habitats and ecosystems from the
encroachment of highway infrastructure.
At this time EPA is working with several organizations to improve
our understanding of the costs and benefits of these technologies,
including their operation and maintenance needs and constraints due to
local ordinances and building codes. While some of this work is being
conducted through research opportunities, EPA is also participating in
data gathering and analysis through demonstration pilots and
benchmarking studies with our State and local government, non-
government, academic and industry partners. Some elements that are
being examined include application, planning, production, operation,
and maintenance costs for these technologies, as well as regulatory
acceptance, market-based incentives and the benefits derived through
cleaner water and air, reduction in energy consumption, and increased
economic growth.
Q2. How is data gathered on the effectiveness of particular
transportation infrastructure technologies for protecting water quality
or managing runoff? How does EPA use the data and information produced
by the Federal Highway Administration to determine whether a technology
is environmentally beneficial? What additional data is needed, and
which organizations or agencies are best situated to perform additional
testing and evaluation? How do these technologies contribute to the
Administration's overall energy use reduction goals?
A2. Much of the data EPA has regarding the effectiveness of green
technologies and green infrastructure practices has been the result of
research and intensive monitoring conducted by a variety of Federal,
State and local government agencies, academic institutions, non-profit
and industry organizations and citizens. The data that is collected, by
the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and other entities, is shared
publicly through various mechanisms, including the International
Stormwater Best Management Practices Database and assorted
publications. Through sharing information and data on best practices,
EPA is promoting the use of green technologies, where appropriate,
throughout the country.
EPA recognizes the importance of sound science in the decision-
making process, including the decision to use green technologies. We
are supporting a robust research program to study the efficacy of many
green practices in varied settings. As indicated above, EPA is working
with several entities to improve our understanding of the costs and
benefits of these technologies. We believe that the information derived
from this, and other independent research efforts, will demonstrate the
energy savings achieved from green infrastructure projects such as
green roofs and increased tree cover, therefore placing even greater
emphasis on the use of these technologies. In addition, EPA believes
there is great potential for green infrastructure practices to reduce
cooling costs and reduce pumping and treatment costs associated with
managing stormwater. Still, there is always more that could be done and
the role that other organizations can play in the development of this
research is limitless.
In order to achieve successful outcomes in the evaluation,
application, and understanding of green transportation infrastructure
technologies, significant collaboration is needed to piece together
aspects of a wide variety of regulations, procedures, procurement
methods, and specification requirements. A functioning partnership is
essential to develop a myriad of timely solutions, particularly given
the need for broader outreach and awareness. A current focus of the
Green Highways Partnership is to implement pilot projects that
demonstrate the concepts of green transportation infrastructure
practices visibly and tangibly. Pilot projects will inform and inspire
the implementation of practices and products that are innovative,
efficient, cost effective, and environmentally sound. The anticipated
outcome of the pilots is to demonstrate sustainable solutions. Pilots
also will serve to improve partnerships and research efforts, while
broadening the body of knowledge on green transportation technologies.
Ouestions submitted by Representative Phil Gingrey
Q1. Can you describe EPA's role in the Green Highway Partnership? How
did your agency get involved in this activity and what do you expect
your role to be in future years? Will EPA request funding for this
partnership beyond the current fiscal year?
A1. EPA is the primary sponsor of the Green Highways Partnership (GHP).
The roots of the Green Highway Partnership run back to 2002, when the
Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) named environmental stewardship
and streamlining one of three ``vital few'' goals. This marked the
beginning of a new era; substantial FHWA investments and improved
coordination with EPA resulted in a wave of environmentally-focused
programs and documents such as Context Sensitive Solutions, the
Exemplary Ecosystem Initiative, and Ecological: An Ecosystem Approach
to Developing Infrastructure Projects. Recognizing the need to
consolidate the myriad of aspects involved in the ``greening'' of U.S.
highways, EPA set out to forge a new and lasting partnership with FHWA
and, thus, the Green Highways Partnership was formed.
Providing much of the leadership, conceptual design, organizational
support, and vision for this multi-disciplinary effort, EPA is
committed to progress in the development of green highways, not only in
the Mid-Atlantic but in other regions across the Nation. EPA has
committed over $1.4 million to this innovative program. The success of
the Partnership, however, has not been the result of any one individual
effort. EPA has combined its resources with that of our partners to
leverage approximately $20 million dollars to reach the program's goal
of ``beyond compliance, better than before.'' Through EPA's green
infrastructure and sustainable infrastructure strategies, we intend to
continue focusing attention on greening our nation's highways. To this
end, EPA will pursue all opportunities to support the advancement of
this effort.
Q2. In your testimony you emphasized the need for cooperation among
academia, private industry, and the EPA Research Office to compile data
regarding the efficacy of green technologies in various contexts. Does
a coordinating mechanism currently exist to guide this research?
A2. Certainly there is a need for cooperation among the numerous
entities with a stake in implementing green technologies. Through the
GHP, EPA has been working cooperatively with a variety of public and
private entities, including FHWA, to ensure that our research efforts
complement one another. While EPA will make its research priorities
known through our website, many times we reach out to our partners to
seek their counsel and coordinate our efforts. In turn, agencies and
organizations, such as FHWA and the American Association of State
Highway Officials, provide EPA with notice to submit proposals for
environmental research ideas and opportunities to collaborate on
research needs. Generally, with EPA, much of this activity is conducted
via the web. However, through the network of Green Highways partners,
we have expanded data and information gathering efforts through which
to share and evaluate green technologies and their performance in
supporting water quality improvements and other environmental benefits.
This venue includes, but is not limited to the following: monthly and
quarterly conference calls and meetings, design charrettes, workshops,
conferences, newsletters and other published articles, webcasts, web-
based training, student-supported programs and internships (college/
university), and jointly-funded studies.
Q3. In his testimony, Mr. Adams asked federal regulators to provide
``very explicit green lights that this is not just okay to experiment
with, but this is okay to begin to have as part of the way of doing
business.'' Your written testimony and the March 5th memo to the
Regional Administrators assert EPA's acceptance of these approaches.
Does the EPA plan further actions to increase awareness of green
infrastructure approaches and there use?
A3. EPA is providing clarification to regional offices and State NPDES
programs that green infrastructure technologies, may, in the
appropriate circumstances, be used in lieu of more traditional
wastewater treatment collection and control technologies for meeting
water quality objectives in permits and settlements. As with any
regulatory program, the necessary accountability provisions will be
needed (e.g., Do models or data reasonably predict that standards will
be met? Are appropriate monitoring or evaluation provisions in place?).
In addition, EPA is developing model municipal separate storm sewer
system (MS4) language that can be used to provide permitting
authorities and permittees alternatives to traditional stormwater
management measures. We are also documenting examples of permits,
combined sewer overflow long-term control plans, and enforcement
agreements that have included green infrastructure provisions. We are
also drafting some general information on how the permitting and
enforcement processes can more easily facilitate more wide-spread use
of green infrastructure. EPA is actively encouraging all permitting and
enforcement authorities to harness opportunities where green
infrastructure approaches are appropriate and effective solutions to
water quality issues.
Q4. In his testimony, Mr. Kasoff urged federal officials to consider
how they might promote a focus on improving environmental quality
rather than mitigating potential damage. What incentives does EPA have
for projects to improve overall environmental quality rather than
simply meet regulations meant to avoid harm?
A4. EPA agrees with Mr. Kasoff that we should strive not only to
mitigate potential damage but also to improve environmental quality. As
EPA Assistant Administrator Grumbles explained in his March 5, 2007,
memorandum, ``Using Green Infrastructure to Protect Water Quality in
Stormwater, CSO, Non-point Source and Other Water Programs,'' green
infrastructure provides many positive environmental and social
benefits, including: cleaner water, enhanced water supplies (stormwater
percolation through the soil to recharge the groundwater and the base
flow for streams); cleaner air, reduced urban temperatures; increased
energy efficiency; community livability and aesthetics; and cost
savings. EPA supports local communities' efforts to achieve all of
these goals.
EPA has a number of programs that focus on the promotion of low
impact development (LID) and other community greening techniques that
help local communities to develop and redevelop in a more
environmentally sustainable manner. Using Clean Water Act Section 319
grants awarded by EPA, states have focused approximately $10 million on
the implementation of projects including green roofs, rain gardens, and
bioswales, as well as projects that protect and restore valued riparian
and waterfront areas. Similar projects have been funded under the CWA's
State Revolving Loan Fund. EPA's Brownfield's program has funded
projects that incorporate green infrastructure into redevelopment
activities that restore vitality to many urban neighborhoods.
We believe that our efforts to date are bearing fruit, as we see
more and more communities around the U.S. working to integrate green
infrastructure into their programs and policies, such as Chicago's
commitment to greening the city with green roofs and other green
practices, and Kansas City's commitment to create 10,000 rain gardens.
In addition, many cities and states are adopting new regulations and
policies that require that any new development or redevelopment to
consider the use of green infrastructure as the first option in
addressing stormwater that would result from the development.
EPA supports further acceleration of local communities' use of
green infrastructure. On April 19, EPA Administrator Steve Johnson
signed a commitment with a number of partnering organizations
(including the Natural Resources Defense Council, the National
Association of Clean Water Agencies, the Low Impact Development Center,
and others) that expressed the signatories' mutual commitment to
collaborate on efforts to encourage the use of green infrastructure. We
are working together expeditiously to develop a joint agenda and to
begin acting on various items, including developing a research agenda,
providing guidance and tools that promote the expanded use of green
infrastructure, analyzing and publicizing the economic and other
benefits of green development, and other action items. We look forward
to continuing to expand the number of states and communities throughout
the country that incorporate LID and other green approaches as critical
and fundamental components of their development and redevelopment
policies and programs.
Lastly, as we mentioned in our response to Question #2, although we
are still in the data gathering phase with our Green Highways partners,
we have used these collaborative research and demonstration pilot
efforts to share and evaluate green technologies and their performance
in supporting water quality improvements and other environmental
benefits.
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Sam Adams, Commissioner of Public Utilities, City of
Portland, Oregon
Questions submitted by Chairman David Wu
Q1. How has the City of Portland used information on green
transportation infrastructure technologies provided by federal agencies
to assist in developing the Green Streets Initiative? As a city
executive, what strategies would you recommend to the EPA and FHWA for
making their work on green infrastructure more accessible to local
government officials?
A1. Portland hasn't had to rely on the assistance of federal agencies
because the City's green transportation initiatives pre-dated federal
efforts by several years. For example, our first parking lot swales
were developed in the late 1980s. Our manual of stormwater technologies
was first published in 1999. We have been developing and refining green
transportation technologies continuously for more than a dozen years.
We recognized, early on, that the City could employ natural systems to
achieve multiple environmental goals at lower capital costs than
traditional stormwater infrastructure. Since then, Portland has sought
opportunities to green our infrastructure whenever practical. Early
adoption of green technologies has been propelled by overlaying federal
requirements to protect surface water and ground water resources,
restore endangered fish populations and restore natural habitats.
We recommend that EPA and FHWA work with NACWA, NRDC, State and
local stormwater and transportation agencies, academic institutions and
private parties to develop regionally-sensitive guides to green
transportation technologies. These guides would be indispensable to
communities that are at the early stages of developing stormwater
management plans to comply with the Clean Water Act. Wherever possible,
EPA and FHWA should build on the extensive work of existing stormwater
utilities, actively engage State and local partners in the development
of stormwater guides, and develop extensive training programs to ensure
local use of green transportation infrastructure.
Q2. What are the estimated life cycle cost savings for the City of
Portland if green transportation infrastructure is used citywide? What
factors are included in this estimate?
A2. We know that green transportation infrastructure can yield
construction savings. We also know that green transportation
technologies can be designed and constructed at savings of 20 percent
to 63 percent when compared to traditional storm sewer solutions. Our
most simple and efficient green street technology (curb extensions)
appears to cost less than half of the cost of sewer separation projects
in Portland combined sewer basin.
On the operations side, we expect to see additional savings in
long-term maintenance costs as our experience increases. We will fully
document the added value of green technologies as we improve our
ability to measure and value ecosystem benefits, such as improved air
and water quality, increased natural habitat, lower energy costs,
increased carbon sequestration and reduced heat island effects.
Q3. You recommend in your testimony that the Federal Government should
support R&D for new green technologies. In your opinion, what are the
most pressing research needs in the field of green transportation
infrastructure? Should Federal R&D programs focus more strongly on
technology development or testing and evaluation? How would the City of
Portland use the results of the R&D you recommend?
A3. As you are aware, green transportation infrastructure relies on
natural processes to capture, treat, transport and dispose of
stormwater runoff. Soils and plants are integral components of green
technologies. While we are experienced in designing and constructing
green facilities, we have much to learn about the interplay of soils
and plants within these facilities.
We recommend that Federal R&D programs focus on documenting the
natural functions of green technologies, specifically the performance
of plants and soils under varied conditions, in varied combinations, to
achieve varied stormwater management objectives. Investment must be
made in both testing and development to ensure successful
implementation of green transportation infrastructure. Research
undertaken nationally will substantiate the impacts of slope, soil,
depth to groundwater, and other factors that determine effectiveness.
Robust monitoring and testing conducted over an extended period of time
will allow cities to determine the most effective locations, conditions
and compositions of each type of green technology and provide
meaningful performance information and guidance about effective
maintenance regiments.
Portland invests limited rate-payer resources to test and monitor
the effectiveness of our green technologies. However, our results are
specific to the geology, geography and hydrology in Portland. While
this information maybe indicative of how facilities can be useful,
success will not be assured without performance information from a
variety of conditions. Portland will benefit from national research
that engages State and local stormwater agencies, academic institutions
and private stakeholders. A broad-based approach to the research will
produce more comprehensive evaluations and deepen our collective
knowledge of green technologies. We recommend that all research
findings be made readily available to all interested parties as the
research unfolds.
Question submitted by Representative Phil Gingrey
Q1. During your testimony, you asked federal regulators to provide
``very explicit green lights that this is not just okay to experiment
with, but this is okay to begin to have as part of the way of doing
business.'' Mr. Grumbles' written testimony states, ``EPA believes that
green infrastructure approaches and practices can be a significant
component of State's and cities' programs to reduce and control
stormwater, combined sewer overflows, and non-point source pollution.''
This sentiment also appears in his March 5th memo to EPA regional
administrators. What other actions do you suggest EPA take to meet your
request?
A1. We applaud Mr. Grumbles' commitment to green infrastructure and
stand ready to work with the EPA to develop any policies that further
the use of these green technologies. Mr. Grumbles has given life to a
fundamental change in the way we think about stormwater, the way we
manage the built and natural landscapes, and the way we regulate
watershed health and water quality.
Portland's success in adopting and advancing green technologies
depends on a fundamental rethinking of our laws, engineering
principals, design standards, utility operations and public engagement.
This rethinking must include EPA and extend to State and local
governments. Without a close partnership with federal and State
regulators, municipalities will not be able or willing to expend the
time and resources to advance this initiative.
EPA's green infrastructure policies must be guided by measurable
federal, State and local performance goals. EPA should encourage
adaptive management to convert learning into continuous improvements,
and renew its commitment to green technologies through the periodic
refinement of laws and regulations to eliminate uncertainty and
obstacles to progress. For optimum success of green technologies,
commitment to these innovations must be expressed and memorialized in
laws, intergovernmental agreements and permits that can be sustained
across federal, State and local administrations.
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Daniel J. Huffman, Managing Director, National Resources,
National Ready Mixed Concrete Association
Questions submitted by Chairman David Wu
Q1. Please describe the type of maintenance pervious pavements
require. With proper maintenance, how long will the pavement maintain
optimal filtering performance? What are the effects on filtering if
maintenance is not performed? At the end of the pavement's life cycle,
can it be disposed of in a conventional manner?
A1. Pervious concrete pavements are infiltration-based systems. Water
passing through the pavement will carry with it varying degrees of
soluble and insoluble pollutants and debris. Most of this debris will
be deposited on or near the surface of the pavement. Optimal
performance of pervious concrete requires that the void structure be
maintained to provide sufficient infiltration of stormwater. The
majority of pervious concrete pavements function well with little or no
maintenance.
Maintenance of pervious concrete consists primarily of prevention
of clogging of the void structure. This can be achieved by vacuum/
sweeping or pressure washing the pavement. Independent studies have
shown each of these procedures to be effective in restoring the
infiltration capabilities of the pervious concrete to accommodate
design storms. Research conducted by the Florida Concrete and Products
Association, and reported in the American Concrete Institute's
Committee 522, Pervious Concrete Report, quantifies the extent of
contaminant infiltration in pervious concrete pavement systems. Five
existing pervious concrete parking lots were examined in the study, and
the level of contaminant infiltration was found to be in the range of
0.16 to 3.4 percent of the total void volume after eight years of
service. Sweeping the surface of the pervious concrete immediately
restored over 50 percent of the permeability of the clogged pavement.
A University of Central Florida (UCF), report titled Construction
and Maintenance of Pervious Concrete Pavement, published in January,
2007 documents the findings of a study conducted on eight existing
pervious concrete parking lots, ranging from six to 20 years of
service. The sample lots were evaluated to determine the infiltration
rates of pervious concrete systems that received relatively no
maintenance. Infiltration rates were measured using an embedded single-
ring infiltrometer developed specifically for testing pervious concrete
in an in-situ state. In-situ infiltration rates ranged from 2.1 to 75.4
inches per hour, which indicates that sample lots though compromised,
had retained functionality.
From the eight parking lots, a total of 30 pervious concrete cores
were extracted and evaluated for infiltration rates after various
rehabilitation techniques were performed to improve the infiltration
capability of the concrete. The techniques were pressure washing,
vacuum sweeping and a combination of the two methods. Researchers found
that the three methods of maintenance investigated in this study
typically resulted in a 200 percent or greater increase over the pre-
treatment infiltration rates of the clogged pervious concrete cores.
Thus, with respect to longevity, the UCF study indicates that even
minimal maintenance will ensure long term pervious functionality.
Frequency of maintenance is, in part, a function of the site and
the pavement design. The pervious concrete system should be designed
such that washout from adjacent soil areas is not allowed to drain onto
the pavement. Periodic visual inspection of the pavement can determine
when cleaning is necessary. The typical maintenance schedule, as
included in the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Best Management
Practices for Stormwater Management: Porous Pavements Facts Sheet,
calls for monthly visual inspection of the pavement to ensure that it
is clean of debris and that it sufficiently dewaters between storms;
vacuum/sweep or pressure wash on an ``as needed'' basis; and annual
inspection of the surface for deterioration or spalling. Average costs
for maintenance of pervious concrete can range widely, dependent on the
amount of sediment and debris that is allowed to collect on the
pavement. Common practice, however, shows these costs to be minimal, in
most cases limited to similar costs for sweeper/vacuum of conventional
pavement. One option is to include maintenance planning as part of the
original project cost, which typically represents a very small
percentage of that cost.
In a 2003, the City of Olympia, Washington issued its Report on
Cleaning of Porous Concrete Sidewalk. The sidewalk, installed in 1999,
was 5.5 feet wide and 1,500 feet long and had maintenance performed for
four years. The void structure was visibly clogged with debris from
tree leaves and needles, and had moss growing in the most abundantly
clogged areas. The city successfully used pressure washing to clean out
the debris in a mere 41 man-hours. Following the washing, the surface
pores were visibly clean and open.
Pervious concrete, similar to conventional concrete, is
manufactured using no hazardous materials. While the pervious concrete
pavement system does filter certain chemicals, heavy metals, and other
pollutants, these suspended solids occur within the filter bed and
earthen sub-base below the actual pervious concrete. Therefore,
pervious concrete that has reached the end of its life cycle can be
recycled and/or disposed of by conventional means.
Q2. What channels exist for industry to introduce green transportation
technologies and show proof of concept to State and federal regulatory
agencies? What actions should the Federal Government take to encourage
both private development and private adoption of new technologies?
A2. NRMCA believes that one of the ways it can support the introduction
of green pavement technologies is through advancement of highly
developed standards combined with a robust construction training
programs. NRMCA, along with the Portland Cement Association (PCA), are
active in the development of guideline specifications for the design
and use of pervious concrete through participation in the American
Concrete Institute (ACI) standard setting committees. Currently, NRMCA
and PCA are working through ACI Committee 522 towards the revision of
ACI 522R-06 which addresses pervious concrete construction and
maintenance. NRMCA and PCA are also finalizing a document on design of
pervious concrete pavements for structural and hydrological
requirements that will include software to assist in design
applications.
NRMCA is involved in a newly formed American Society for Testing
and Materials (ASTM) subcommittee to develop standards for testing and
evaluation of pervious concrete. An NRMCA staff member chairs this
subcommittee. ASTM is an organization that develops consensus standards
that are used globally for various materials and products. In addition,
to enhance greater utilization of pervious technology, NRMCA has
embarked on a national program for the certification of Pervious
Concrete Contractors which has resulted in 1200 certifications in the
last 18 months.
Moreover, in order to provide a practical response to the growing
interest in pervious concrete pavements for stormwater management, the
American Concrete Pavement Association (ACPA) has released a new
publication, ``Stormwater Management with Pervious Concrete Pavement.''
This user-friendly document details applications, considerations,
limitations, and benefits of pervious concrete on stormwater
management.
The concrete industry's training efforts have been complimented by
the EPA, which has accepted pervious concrete as a recommended Best
Management Practice (BMP) for stormwater management on a local and
regional basis. However, due to a lack of understanding of the efficacy
of the BMP, many State and local planners still have failed to fully
utilize pervious concrete and some have actually excluded pervious
pavements from their own BMPs. It is clear that this is a problem that
needs to be addressed on a regional basis by means of further education
on the part of both EPA and industry.
One vehicle for providing timely information about ``state-of-the-
art'' technologies and for accelerating their development and use are
public-private partnerships. One such partnership is the Mid-Atlantic
Green Highways Partnership (GHP) of which NRMCA and ACPA are active
members. The GHP has diverse members including the Industrial Resources
Council, the Conservation Fund and the Pennsylvania Department of
Environmental Protection. The GHP is grounded in a commitment to
developing ecologically advanced infrastructure projects. GHP seeks to
transform the manner in which the Nation's transportation
infrastructure is planned and constructed through a blending of
integrated planning, regulatory flexibility, and market-based rewards.
Included in this effort is the goal of achieving broader utilization of
green pavement technologies that will help support superior watershed-
driven stormwater management. In this regard, the GHP provides a unique
opportunity for industry to collaborate with Federal, State and local
governments to introduce ``state-of-the-art'' technologies such as
pervious concrete. In fact, the GHP has produced a cooperative
partnership between EPA's Region III and NRMCA leading to a research
grant for Villanova University to evaluate the water quality and other
attributes of competing porous pavement systems. The grant has come
from EPA with assistance from the RMC Research and Education Foundation
and Villanova University.
One of the principal benefits of the GHP is that it allows for the
front-loading of the environmental review process through demonstration
projects that can demonstrate proof of concept. NRMCA believes that
proof of concept must involve an integrated planning approach that
provides for early stakeholder involvement prior to initiation of the
National Environmental Policy Act process. In order to secure
regulatory acceptance of the technology and to streamline the
permitting process it is often necessary to front-load consultation and
coordination with citizens and local government agencies in order to
fully educate them about the benefits of using green pavement
technologies as a tool to comply with various environmental
requirements. As part of the GHP, NRMCA has recently made a commitment
to participate in the U.S. 301 Waldorf Maryland Transportation
Improvements Project that will provide a forum early in the
environmental impact assessment stage to meet with regulators and train
them on utilizing pervious concrete as an alternative for meeting low-
impact development (LID) and stormwater management objectives.
Similarly, NRMCA looks forward to working with EPA Region III and the
FHWA as part of the Anacostia Restoration Project which supports LID
and sustainable transportation systems in and around the Anacostia
watershed in the District of Columbia and Maryland.
Q3. What R&D, including testing and evaluation, is required to make
pervious pavement more feasible for use in higher traffic areas, such
as roads and highways? What are the costs and benefits of expanding the
use of pervious pavement?
How difficult is it to get construction contractors to use green
transportation infrastructure technologies? What additional education
is necessary to encourage builders and architects to specify green
technologies in their design plans? Is there a role for the Federal
Government in educating builders, architects, and other engineers?
A3. The federal tax code provides about $500 billion each year in
incentives intended to encourage socially-valued activities, including
homeownership, charitable contributions, health insurance, and
education. NRMCA believes that adoption of green pavement technologies
should be included as one of these socially-valued activities. By
supporting new green technologies, the government can offer every
American an opportunity to enjoy higher water quality and a better,
more sustainable environment at lower costs.
One model for rewarding socially-valued activity is the Energy
Policy Act of 2005, which offers consumers and businesses federal tax
credits for purchasing fuel-efficient hybrid-electric vehicles and
energy-efficient appliances and products. The benefits to the
environment in terms of reduced air pollution of buying and driving a
fuel-efficient vehicle and purchasing and installing energy efficient
appliances and home improvement products are obvious. Consumers who
purchase and install specific products such as energy efficient
windows, insulation, doors, roofs and heating and cooling equipment in
the home can receive a tax credit of up to $500 for eligible purchases.
In the same manner, homeowners that install a pervious concrete
driveway should be eligible for a proportionate tax credit for helping
to reduce stormwater runoff. Also, businesses that employ pervious
concrete pavement around buildings (walkways, courtyards, etc.) and
parking areas and low volume roads in housing subdivisions should be
eligible for tax credits on both new construction as well as
improvements to existing properties.
Tax credits are generally a more valuable incentive than an
equivalent tax deduction because a tax credit reduces tax dollar-for-
dollar, while a deduction only removes a percentage of the tax that is
owed. Yet, there are also beneficial models for tax deductions that
have proven to be effective in environmental clean-up. One example is
the Brownfields Tax Incentive that was passed as part of the Taxpayer
Relief Act of 1997. Brownfields are properties where reuse is
complicated by environmental contamination concerns. The incentive
allows a taxpayer to fully deduct the costs of environmental cleanups
in the year the costs were incurred rather being capitalized and spread
over a period of years. Its purpose is to spur the cleanup and
redevelopment of brownfields. A similar tax incentive should be
afforded to developers who replace antiquated conventional stormwater
management systems in industrial and residential properties with an LID
approach that combines a hydrologically functional site design with
pavement technologies like pervious concrete to compensate for land
development impacts on hydrology and water quality.
Other examples of support for environmentally preferable products
can be found in federal procurement policy. In 1983, EPA promulgated
the first federal procurement guideline that required all federal and
all State and local government agencies and contractors that use
federal funds to implement a preference program favoring the purchase
of cement and concrete containing fly ash. EPA published a summary of
information pertaining to coal combustion products use in an
environmental fact sheet, Guideline for Purchasing Cement and Concrete
Containing Fly Ash (EPA530-SW-91-086, January 1992). In addition,
Executive Order (E.O.) 12873, Federal Acquisition, Recycling, and Waste
Prevention, signed on October 20, 1993, directs federal agencies to
develop affirmative procurement programs for environmentally preferable
products. With respect to the cement and concrete containing fly-ash,
E.O. 12873 requires that 100 percent of the purchases meet or exceed
the EPA guideline standards unless written justification is provided
that a product is not available competitively within a reasonable time
frame, does not meet appropriate performance standards, or is only
available at an unreasonable price. These same types of procurement
requirements would be highly effective drivers of green pavement
technologies in federally supported combined sewer overflow projects as
well as in surface transportation projects that present stormwater
management challenges.
Congress has also recognized the importance of using innovative
technologies in water quality management, both in terms of funding
research into possible new technologies and in demonstrating existing
(but relatively new) technologies. In the 1977 Clean Water Act
amendments, Congress established a three-year innovative and
alternative technologies (known as ``I/A'') program. The I/A program
helped successfully move technologies such as land treatment of
wastewater, sludge composting and alternative collection systems from
relative obscurity to widespread acceptance. For example, the I/A
program documented successes and problems with ultraviolet
disinfection. This method is now routinely accepted as an alternative
to chlorination, especially where there are concerns about security or
toxic effects of residual chlorine and chlorine byproducts. The program
also demonstrated that I/A technologies can reduce costs while
increasing environmental performance.
To further encourage research into innovative green pavement
technology, it is critical that EPA establish both a research and
development program and a demonstration grant program. The research
program should be aimed at: (1) increasing the effectiveness and
efficiency of water supply systems (including source water protection,
stormwater reuse, and protection of the hydrology of wetlands, streams
and sub-surface waters); (2) encouraging the use of innovative or
alternative approaches relating to reduction of impervious surfaces;
and (3) increasing the effectiveness of waste water systems through
incorporation of impervious pavements, nonstructural alternatives,
water efficiency, and methods of dispersing, reusing, reclaiming and
recycling wastewater.
The demonstration grant program should target water quality
management and enhancement by promoting innovations in technology and
alternative approaches with the goal of reducing municipal costs of
complying with the Clean Water Act. Communities selected for grants
must describe a strategy by which the demonstration grants could
achieve similar goals as (1) those mandated by the Clean Water Act
(e.g., requirements of stormwater permits under the National Pollution
Discharge Elimination System) or (2) those that could be achieved by
traditional stormwater management methods. The Administrator should
provide grants for water supply or water quality matters relating to
urban or suburban population pressure; difficulties in water
conservation and efficiency; non-point source pollution; sanitary or
combined sewer overflows; or a lack of an alternative water supply.
Precedent for a recommended EPA demonstration grant programs that
would support green pavement technologies can be found in the Surface
Transportation Environment and Planning Cooperative Research Program
(STEP), administered by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). The
general objective of STEP, which was created by SAFETEA-LU in Section
5207, is to improve understanding through research of the complex
relationship between surface transportation, planning and the
environment. STEP is the sole source of SAFETEA-LU funds available to
conduct FHWA research on planning and environmental issues. It has
already addressed specific high utility stormwater initiatives
including the International Stormwater Best Management Practices
Database, Evaluation and Update of FHWA Pollutant Loadings Model for
Highway Stormwater Runoff, and Synthesis on the Fate and Effects of
Chloride from Road Salt Applied to Highways for Deicing.
Ultimately, to ensure that green pavement technologies are actually
deployed, State and local planners and agencies responsible for
administering of the Nation's water quality program have to have
confidence that all proven technologies are fully available to them to
meet the Clean Water Act's goals and requirements. As such, it is
recommended that Section 603(c) of the Clean Water Act be amended to
identify that financial assistance is available from the State
Revolving Loan Fund program for stormwater management projects, to
include the use of pervious pavement technologies.
NRMCA appreciates the opportunity to answer questions submitted for
the record by Members of the Subcommittee. If you need additional
information, please feel free to contact Robert L. Sullivan, NRMCA's
Senior Vice President of Government & Legal Affairs at (240) 485-1148
or at [email protected].
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Hal Kassoff, Senior Vice President for Sustainable
Development, Parsons Brinckerhoff
Questions submitted by Chairman David Wu
Q1. What State or federal regulations have affected your company's
green infrastructure practices?
A1. With transportation representing the largest part of our business,
federal regulations relating to NEPA, Clean Water, Clean Air, Historic
Preservation, Rare and Endangered Species, Storm Water Management, and
Noise all have a profound impact on the projects that we work on for
our clients. While each area has its own legislation and regulations,
and this in and of itself can be problematic, the prevailing approach
among them when it comes to the potential impacts associated with
projects can perhaps best be described as ``avoid, minimize,
mitigate.'' This concept is reasonable as a regulatory foundation for
achieving green infrastructure. A minimum bar must be set to protect
our resources and that bar is, in essence, defined by those three
words--first do no harm if that is possible, and if some degree of harm
is unavoidable then the next rung on the ladder is to minimize that
harm with all reasonable measures, as well as mitigate the harm by
somehow replacing the functional value of what was lost--this could
mean anything from wetland creation to enhancing an historic district.
The ``affect'' of these regulations is to allow many projects to
proceed but to do so in as green a manner is possible.
However, there is often even more that can be done if our mindset
is advanced one more notch from avoid, minimize and mitigate harm to
creating a positive (better than before) net outcome with respect to
the natural, social and built environments. This simply means that in
addition to meeting regulatory standards for avoiding, minimizing and
mitigating harm, transportation and environmental resource
professionals might seek outcomes in which at little or no additional
cost, measures might be taken to improve upon the environmental
footprint that pre-existed the project. Such opportunities most often
arise from the fact that the vast majority of projects--certainly in
the highway business--involve upgrading existing facilities, few of
which were built to current standards of environmental protection.
The problem is that to do more than regulations require, by
definition is impossible to regulate. So when we ask what can be done
from a regulatory perspective to improve the likelihood of achieving
``green infrastructure'' the answer has to be nothing beyond the avoid,
minimize and mitigate harm ``standard'' and then everything to
encourage voluntary efforts to find reasonable and affordable ways to
go beyond regulatory minimums as a normal matter of doing business--
with the attendant benefits of an improved natural, social and built
environment, and improved relationships and greater trust between
project sponsors and resource regulators.
Q2. In your opinion, what are the most pressing research needs in the
field of green transportation infrastructure? Should federal R&D
programs focus more strongly on technology development or testing and
evaluation? How would Parsons Brinckerhoff use the results of that R&D?
A2. A particularly pressing need involving research is to improve the
ability of resource agencies to have access to and to apply the
science, and a factual foundation, behind what are perceived, but are
not in fact always proven to be, the real harmful effects of projects,
as well as the real benefits of mitigation and enhancement measures.
This point is perhaps best illustrated with a story about one of the
most significant environmental challenges I had encountered in my 40
plus years in this business.
We had completed and received federal approval of the Environmental
Impact Statement for a long-awaited highway project and after an
additional two years to complete final design and acquire right-of-way,
we were stopped in our tracks at the wetland permitting stage when
federal resource agencies told us that notwithstanding the approved
EIS, the project would not receive necessary wetland permits. The
reason cited was that during the permit review stage it was determined
that the wetland impacts were too severe and that design changes would
be needed, even though they would delay the project by over a year and
add $20 million in cost.
After engaging a renowned wetland expert to assess the situation we
learned from him the good news was that the resource agencies were
mistaken and were, in fact, reacting literally to surface appearances
in attempting to protect a pristine looking wetland area that was
actually created by poor drainage from an adjacent project. The other
somewhat ironic news we were given was that while the area the resource
agencies wanted to protect could not be backed up by a factual
analysis, there was indeed another area that had been dismissed as
being of low value--again largely due to surface appearances--which had
a very significant function as a wetland due to its sub-surface
connection to important aquifers. So in the end we suffered the delay
and most of the additional cost, but had the satisfaction of knowing
that the harm we prevented was real.
Related to the need to get the information to practitioners and
ensure that it is used, is the need for better information about what
mitigation measures are most effective and which ones are marginal.
Again, using wetlands as an example, how effective have the many
thousands of very small, on site, difficult to maintain mitigation
sites proven to be compared to some of the larger, off-site and even
out-of-watershed measures, such as wetland banking.
Finally, is it possible to develop cross functional green
infrastructure mitigation to address situations where the resource
affected is not particularly scarce and replacing the loss would have
marginal, if any benefit, but on the other hand another resource, which
was perhaps not affected, is threatened. So instead of replacing five
acres of wetland adjacent to a 50,000 acre wetland system would it be
of greater value to use mitigation funding for upland habitat
preservation in connection with an endangered mammal? What are the
tradeoffs. How are they quantified? What are the institutional barriers
and how can they be overcome?
Questions submitted by Representative Phil Gingrey
Q1. Does current research successfully encapsulate the local
environmental factors that affect Best Management Practices which are
appropriate for different environments? Does for instance, the
International Stormwater Best Management Practices Database include all
of the relevant performance data? And if not, are the gaps known and
being addressed by State or federal research programs?
A1. While I am unable to respond to these questions I have asked
members of our firm who might be able to address them to do so. (Their
response follows.)
Many excellent studies have been conducted to evaluate the
performance, pollutant removal efficiency and cost of various types of
storm water BMPs. Of these research projects, however, only a few were
specifically designed to study geographic variation. EPA has published
some information regarding site specific BMP information, regional
limitation and operation and maintenance burdens of these BMPs, but not
in great and practical details sufficient to guide selection and
installation. Cooperative research efforts such as the International
Stormwater BMP Database project have done an excellent job in reaching
out and collecting storm water BMP data. The sites contained in the
database to date, however, are not yet geographically diverse. A large
amount of data has come from a small number of states, such as
California, Texas, and Florida. Not many BMP data represent the
Northeast, Mid-Atlantic and Midwest. For the State of Maryland, for
example, only two BMP data sets were presented despite the numerous
storm water BMPs that have been applied in the past two decades. This
poor geographic distribution of the data set makes study of the
geographic variation in BMP performance statistically difficult.
Another gap in research is the type of BMPs being studied. For
example, one can more readily find detention pond-based BMPs
performance data, mainly due to its long history of implementation. One
can also find many proprietary BMPs, such as hydrodynamic devices, on
the Internet particularly due to commercial interests. By comparison,
there is limited information and research related to low impact
development (LID) BMP techniques such as bioretention, grass swales,
and infiltration.
Q2. What recommendations do you have for improving university
awareness and education of green infrastructure practices?
A2. Clearly our universities as well as our agencies and businesses
that employ practitioners would benefit from greater cross
fertilization of ideas--through internships among students, continuing
education for practitioners, conferences, and the like. The notion of
green infrastructure in the U.S. is still relatively new but interest
in it is growing very rapidly. Certainly if Congress expressed its
interest in and provided additional funding for research and
educational programs centered upon green infrastructure (hopefully with
earmarks), that would send a powerful message.
Q3. How can federal agencies such as FHWA and EPA create incentives
for projects to improve environmental quality rather than simply meet
regulations to avoid harm?
A3. The most important aspect of this question is the implied
recognition that regulations will not succeed in going beyond the
``avoid, minimize and mitigate harm'' standard. Simply put, what we
need is ensure success of the current Green Highways Partnership
``experiment'' in the Mid-Atlantic.
Transportation agencies which become convinced that a ``better than
before'' environmental stewardship ethic is not only the right thing to
do but yields practical benefits in gaining the trust and confidence of
resource agencies will clearly move in that direction. Similar movement
is needed among resource agencies to see that win-win outcomes are
possible with their pro-active support and that a track record of poor
relationships and frequent appeals means that they may not be working
hard enough to find win-win solutions.
While doing more than meeting minimum requirements to improve the
environment will not happen through legislation, programs to identify,
recognize, celebrate and spread the word about green infrastructure
successes in the U.S. and elsewhere can and should be defined.
Appendix 2:
----------
Additional Material for the Record
Statement of The Interlocking Concrete Pavement Institute
Mr. Chairman, my name is Randall G. Pence, Capitol Hill Advocates,
Inc. I am pleased to offer testimony on behalf of ICPI, the
Interlocking Concrete Pavement Institute with offices at 1444 I St.,
NW, Washington, DC 20005.
ICPI represents producers and installers of segmental interlocking
concrete pavers in the United States, Canada and elsewhere. ICPI is the
voice of the segmental interlocking concrete pavement industry and is
the leader in efforts to develop the industry in the Americas through
technological research, engineering, product development and
innovation, marketing, government relations and public relations.
Segmental interlocking concrete pavements provide multiple benefits
of interest in public policy. For the purposes of today's hearing, I
will focus on the characteristics of paver surfaces as permeable
interlocking concrete pavements (PICP).
PICP are comprised of a layer of concrete pavers placed in layers
of small stones and separated by joints filled with even smaller
stones. Permeable pavements provide tremendous stormwater runoff
advantages. The concrete paving units are not permeable, but the joints
between them, typically 5-10 mm wide, provide permeability. They allow
water to percolate through the base materials to be absorbed in local
soils rather than flow across non-pervious pavements, carrying surface
pollutants to the Nation's rivers. Further, there is a filtration
benefit as stormwater travels though the permeable pavements and the in
situ soils.
PICPs are highly effective in providing infiltration, detention and
treatment of storm water pollution. The base can be designed to filter,
treat and slowly release water into a storm sewer or water course while
providing a walking and driving surface. PICPs answer the call from
municipal regulations to limit impervious covers and runoff into storm
drains working at capacity, or when sites have limited space for
detention ponds. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and several
State agencies consider PICPs an infiltration Best Management Practice
(BMP). An increasing number of cities, counties and states are
incorporating them into land development and runoff standards, low-
impact development guidelines and design manuals on stormwater control.
With proper design, material selection, construction and routine
maintenance, PICP is a sustainable low-impact BMP used by landscape
architects, architects, engineers, developers and public agency staff.
PICPs have been widely used across Europe, especially Germany since the
early 1990s. The paving products shown in the exhibit attached to this
testimony demonstrate runoff reduction and improved water quality in a
range of climates, soils, hydrological and regulatory environments.
As urbanization increases, so does the concentration of pavements,
buildings and other impervious surfaces. These surfaces generate
additional runoff and pollutants during rainstorms causing stream-bank
erosion, as well as degenerating lakes and polluting sources of
drinking water. Increased runoff also deprives groundwater from being
recharged, decreasing the amount of available drinking water in many
communities. Recreational opportunities from lakes, streams and rivers
decline from the impacts of urban runoff. Commercial fishing
productivity can decline in estuaries and bays thereby negatively
impacting regional economies. In response to environmental and economic
impacts from stormwater runoff, U.S. federal law mandates that states
control water pollution in runoff through the National Pollutant
Discharge Elimination System (NPDES). Among many things, the law
requires that states and localities implement best management practices
BMPs to control non-point source pollution in runoff from development.
BMPs can include storage, filtration and infiltration land development
practices. Infiltration practices capture runoff and rely on
infiltration through soils, vegetation, or aggregates for the reduction
of pollutants. Detention ponds are a common BMP example used to hold,
infiltrate, and release stormwater. Infiltration trenches are another
that reduce stormwater runoff and pollution, and replenish groundwater.
All of these BMPs provide some treatment and reduction of runoff
pollutants.
In preparation for this hearing, Subcommittee staff have asked ICPI
to address these issues:
1. What environmentally-friendly transportation infrastructure
technologies are available to private developers? What are the costs
and benefits associated with these technologies? How do these
technologies contribute to environmental protection, including
pollution control and energy efficiency?
2. How do you determine if a technology is environmentally-friendly?
How do life cycle environmental costs affect whether a technology is
considered ``green''?
3. What are the barriers preventing widespread use of these
technologies by private entities?
4. What actions can the Federal Government take to encourage use of
these technologies by private entities?
The first two questions may be attended in brief. Clearly, PICP are
a prime example of an environmentally-friendly transportation
infrastructure technology that is available to all developers--private,
public, institutional, suitable at small and larger scales for
residential, commercial, government, military construction and more.
Costs vary by several factors including location, design complexity and
more but PICP are cost-competitive with other paving surfaces. The
environmental benefits are as set forth above in the introduction to
PICP: effective stormwater management due to the permeable qualities of
the product, improved water quality due to filtration and flood
control. The energy efficiency benefits may not be a distinguishing
factor.
In determining if a technology is environmentally friendly, we
would suggest that a good test would be to assess whether a given
technology tends to bring about environmental conditions more like the
conditions that would exist if there were no development in the
location in question. PICP meet this standard by providing a permeable
surface that can provide substantial in situ absorption and
infiltration as would be expected without development. Life cycle
costing is always a factor for consideration, but finding a valid cost
comparison for a life cycle analysis could be a challenge. For example,
life cycle costs at a specific job site might be relatively easy to
estimate in the long term, it might be more difficult to estimate the
out-year costs of failing to implement green technologies because those
costs could occur downstream of the job site.
Further, any life cycle cost analysis should address infrequent but
potentially overwhelming catastrophic events that are more likely to
occur downstream if innovative technologies are not supported upstream.
Barriers and Solutions
Questions 3 and 4 describe issues that could suggest remedial
action to be supported by the Subcommittee and are best answered
together.
The prime barriers to widespread adoption of green technologies in
transportation, and other construction sectors as well, are initial
construction costs and the general issue of local custom--that which is
familiar and safe in the thinking of local architects, designers and
engineers.
A. The construction industry is well known for intense pressures to
build as quickly and as inexpensively as the legislative, regulatory
and codes schemes will allow. Assuming that most environmentally
friendly construction options that are not being widely used are not
being used because they are not the least costly options for initial
construction, the solution would seem to be for government to provide
financial incentives for green construction. This could take the form
of tax incentives such as targeted tax credits for using approved
technologies. Perhaps accelerated depreciation would be attractive to
private sector entities that would intend to build and own properties.
It may well be the case that such tax incentives would be less
expensive than the costs of catastrophic event responses in the future,
but clearly, tax incentives would be costly and controversial for that
reason, though ICPI would support the concept.
B. Another cost-related barrier is that associated with setting aside
valuable land area for open space to provide infiltration of
stormwater. Open areas can provide strong environmental benefits but
carry large costs which are a prime impediment to their use. Innovative
techniques like PICP can obviate this barrier if they can provide a
dual use of the area, for example, meeting the needs for parking areas
and simultaneously providing infiltration opportunity in the same space
because the parking area is a permeable pavement. As Congress considers
means to move green construction technologies to the mainstream, it
should recognize and provide incentives for efficient use of the land
that allow for development and good environmental impacts without
relying solely on undeveloped open spaces, catch basins and other
costly space-consumptive sole-use techniques. We should assume that
those green technologies that have lower costs in terms of dedicated
land set-asides will be more attractive to developers and face lesser
barriers to adoption on this basis.
C. Perhaps the more pervasive barrier, and one which Congress might
help surmount for small commitments of funding, is the vexing problem
of attracting to deviate from prior practice and custom and to adopt
new technologies. Local governments and local markets have the primary
impact on codes, regulations and customs for construction. The
construction industry tends to stay with what is safe, what is
familiar, and what has been done before.
Congress can have positive impacts in overcoming this barrier by
providing relatively modest funding for innovative technology research,
engineering and demonstration projects to be conducted at the local
level, helping develop local familiarity, local applications, local
reference data, local experience and expertise. Recipients of federal
grant funding for this purpose should be made available to State water
pollution control agencies, interstate agencies, other public or
nonprofit private agencies, institutions, organizations, and
individuals. The purpose would be to conduct and promote the
coordination and acceleration of, research, investigations,
experiments, training, demonstrations, surveys, and studies relating to
the causes, effects, extent, prevention, reduction, and elimination of
pollution, with special emphasis on demonstrating uses of low-impact,
decentralized stormwater control technologies and applications using
permeable pavements, including interlocking concrete pavements, to
prevent and control stormwater run-off at the source.
EPA has such a program in place. Unfortunately, it has not been
funded consistently enough to reach critical mass with the construction
community. ICPI would recommend that the Subcommittee support full
funding for currently authorized EPA programs to award such grants.
What is needed is more funding, especially to demonstrate the
feasibility of technologies like PICP to local government authorities
who determine which technologies are recognized at the local level as
BMPs for stormwater management. This is crucial to widespread adoption
of innovative new BMPs.
ICPI is urging the House Interior Appropriations Subcommittee to
direct funding of $2 million in FY 2008 to fund grant programs
authorized under 33 USC 1254(B)(3) to research and demonstrate
stormwater mitigation demonstration projects nationwide, many of which
will include use of concrete paver technology. We urge this
subcommittee to support funding for these EPA grant programs.
D. As part of its stormwater mandate, EPA maintains the most
comprehensive database of BMPs in the world for the management and
reduction of stormwater runoff. EPA uses the database to make policy
decisions and impact grant funding for stormwater projects. But the
database's impact goes far beyond EPA. Other agencies use the EPA
database to make their stormwater design decisions. Private companies,
designers, architects, and engineers across the world use the database.
The BMP database needs to be updated to reflect a substantial body
of new BMP research. Yet, in the most recent fiscal years, funding for
the Clean Water Act's Section 104(b)(3) funds which EPA would use to
conduct the update have been reduced and eliminated. The BMP update
would significantly add to information regarding the use of concrete
pavers and permeable pavement systems for stormwater mitigation.
Congress could jump-start the BMP update by restoring modest
funding for both the BMP update and the grant program for to ensure
that the construction and design communities worldwide could access the
latest data for their stormwater mitigation strategies. Industries
would offer new data that would focus on the stormwater potential of
making routine use of permeable interlocking concrete pavers to capture
important environment benefits.
ICPI is currently recommending to the House Interior Appropriations
Subcommittee that is renew funding of up to $200,000 in FY 2008 for the
CWA Section 104(b)(3) programs to conduct a major overhaul and update
of the EPA stormwater BMP database, which is likely to include a
substantial upgrade and enhancement of the data describing how concrete
paver technology can be used very effectively to mitigate stormwater
runoff. We recommend that this subcommittee support the recommendation.
E. It is noted in the hearing background documents that a regulatory
barrier to widespread adoption of innovative technologies may be due to
EPA regional offices taking different positions on whether permeable
pavements that inject into the ground should be considered point
sources subject to permitting under the NPDES. Clearly, Congress could
act to remove this barrier by passing legislation to clearly define
permeable pavements that inject into the ground are either not defined
as point sources or are point sources exempt from permitting
requirements under NPDES. EPA should be tasked to standardize
regulatory responses among the regional offices with regard to
permeable pavements.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for this opportunity to provide the views
of ICPI. We look forward to working with you as the Subcommittee
considers policy responses to enhance adoption of these technologies
and would be happy to address the Subcommittee's questions.