What is WSDOT is doing about Climate Change?

WSDOT is addressing Climate Change in many ways. Environmental components are built into WSDOT’s everyday operations including construction, maintenance and ferry activities. 

WSDOT looks at its carbon footprint

As part of our effort to better understand the agency’s impact on the environment and contribution to climate change, WSDOT completed a Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory. The inventory captures emissions from 2007 agency activities, such as operating ferries and powering traffic signals.

WSDOT is one of the first state transportation departments in the nation to quantify its emissions. The inventory is a starting point for finding ways to reduce emissions. Because the vast majority of the agency’s emissions come from energy use, efforts to conserve energy will also reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Transportation system activities address climate change

Here are some WSDOT activities which contribute to a cleaner, greener planet:

Supporting transportation options: For 30 years, WSDOT has supported carpooling, vanpooling, and public transportation through the funding, building, and maintenance of the freeway HOV system, and continues its nationally-recognized Transportation Demand Management and Commute Trip Reduction programs. These programs help to reduce the number of vehicles on the roadway during peak congestion and help reduce total vehicle miles traveled.

HOV lanes, or High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, create alternatives that are more attractive than driving alone. HOV lanes enable commuters to get to work more quickly, and provide an incentive to take the bus, carpool, or vanpool anytime during the day. The HOV lanes also help buses stay on schedule and also provide access for emergency vehicles when needed.

• Every two-person carpool reduces the amount of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions created by that trip in about half.
• Every eight-person vanpool reduces the amount of GHG emissions created by that trip by about 88 percent.

Bicycling and walking: On average, WSDOT adds more than 20 miles of new sidewalk, trails and paths each year. A recent federal study showed that when bicycle and pedestrian safety increases, total vehicle miles traveled is reduced by an estimated 156.1 million miles over the course of a year. These investments can mean savings of more than $23 million in fuel costs, and 67,000 metric tons of reductions in CO2 emissions.

Passenger Rail: State-sponsored Amtrak Cascades is another green transportation alternative available to Washington citizens. Today’s intercity passenger rail service consumes one-third less energy per passenger mile than cars. Rail contributes less CO2 to the atmosphere per passenger mile traveled than do cars or airplanes—about 14%–15% less than cars and nearly 40% less than air travel.

No-idle policy: In 2006, WSDOT adopted a no-idle policy to reduce fuel use and vehicle emissions. We estimate by reducing vehicle idling by 50 percent, we can save as much as $500,000 annually in fuel costs.

LED lights: Currently, the arrow boards and warning beacons used to direct and warn motorists in construction areas and around closed highway lanes can only run when the vehicle is idling. The light emitting diode (LED) technology uses far less energy and can run on battery power for 24 hours or more, which allows operators to use the warning lights and arrow boards with their engines shut down. More than 200 vehicles have been outfitted with LED lights, saving an estimated 121,000 gallons of fuel annually. We estimate that each year this will reduce roughly 4.4 tons of air pollutants and eliminate about 800 tons of carbon dioxide.

Fuel-efficient vehicles:  WSDOT gives priority to hybrid, high-mileage, fuel-efficient, or low-emission vehicles when replacing passenger vehicles in its fleet. In FY2007, we replaced part of our fleet with 86 low-emission vehicles and four high-mileage vehicles.

Incident Response Team (IRT) – WSDOT has 55 Incident Response vehicles that patrol 500 miles of highway to clear blocking incidents quickly and safely. IRT clears 98.6 percent of all incidents in less than 90 minutes, reducing the amount of time motorists spend sitting and idling in traffic.

Reducing diesel emissions: In 2005, WSDOT started using five percent biodiesel (B5) mixed with regular diesel in maintenance vehicles operating in the Central Puget Sound area. Currently, 25 WSDOT fueling stations have 10 percent biodiesel (B10) available and we plan to have 20 percent biodiesel (B20) available this summer depending on availability.

Cleaner running vehicles: In 2007, WSDOT began fitting about 260 vehicles with filtering devices on either or both the exhaust system or the engine crankcase. The diesel oxidation catalyst (working much like a catalytic converter on passenger vehicles) and the closed crankcase ventilation system will reduce diesel particulate emissions by 30 to 40 percent. Vehicles include dump trucks, loaders, sweepers, and bucket trucks. These filters will result in an annual reduction of approximately 2.1 tons of air pollutants.

Using Biodiesel in Ferries: Each year, the state ferry system burns approximately 17 million gallons of diesel fuel on its ferries, making the agency a significant fuel consumer in Puget Sound.  In March 2008, WSF began a pilot project that will test the use of biodiesel in the marine environment. Using biodiesel instead of traditional petroleum-based fuels reduces emission of particulate matter and greenhouse gases, which impact air quality and the Earth’s climate.

Conserving resources

Small changes, such as turning down the thermostat a few degrees and shutting down computers when not in use, can make a big difference when it comes to conservation. These are just a few of the ways WSDOT is reducing energy and conserving resources.

Electricity – Newer, more energy efficient technologies, appliances and equipment have contributed to reducing WSDOT’s electricity use by 22 percent, or 24 million kilowatt hours since fiscal year 2003 to fiscal year 2007. 

• Many WSDOT buildings have motion detecting light systems that turn lights off when no one is in the room
• Our equipment shops are also equipped with automatic trip switches that turn off heaters when bay service doors are open
• Agency computers have new software installed with power-saving features. The software detects idle machines and puts them into stand-by mode to reduce power consumption. WSDOT expects a nearly 50 percent savings of its annual power cost for PCs
• LED lights in traffic signals – By replacing the existing 12 inch incandescent lights in traffic signals WSDOT reduces its electricity consumption annually from 31,600 kilowatt hours (KWH) to 4,744 KWH

Natural Gas – WSDOT reduced its agency wide use of natural gas by 2.4 percent since fiscal year 2003. Some region offices have seen greater reductions as a result of upgrading heating and ventilation systems. For example, in the Southwest Region headquarters in Vancouver, a heating and ventilation improvement project contributed to reductions in electricity use of 10.5 percent and natural gas consumption of 8.6 percent.