Alternative fueling stations to come to Rochester, Monroe County
Democrat and Chronicle
New places to fill up alternative-fuel vehicles are headed to Monroe County, and it’s possible the public will have access to them.
The availability of “green fueling stations” is a major barrier to the purchase of alternative-fuel vehicles by governments and the public, experts say.
Monroe County and the city of Rochester are planning to build up to three stations with a variety of alternative fuels, which are more environmentally friendly than traditional gasoline.
The stations, which will be 80 percent federally funded, would be open to other municipalities. The feasibility of opening them to the public will be studied.
The development will be particularly helpful to the city; its current fueling station on Mt. Read Boulevard is deteriorating and its fleet doesn’t have ready access to alternative fuels and relies mostly on gasoline, according to Commissioner of Environmental Services Paul Holahan. The new stations will allow the city to use more alternative-fuel vehicles.
Almost all of Monroe County’s 844-vehicle fleet can run on alternative fuels, and many — with the exception of many Sheriff’s Office cars — fill up at the county’s alternative station on Scottsville Road, which opened in August 2008. The county has a goal of converting the entire fleet to alternative-fuel vehicles by 2012.
The county will examine providing a variety of alternative fuels at the new stations, including E-85, E-20, biodiesel, compressed natural gas, propane and hydrogen.
If some fuels aren’t immediately available when the stations open, room will be left for them as demand increases.
“It’s sort of like the chicken or the egg,” said Melvin Rose, county fleet manager, explaining whether to build fueling stations first or purchase alternative-fuel vehicles. “You have to prepare yourself for the future when you’re putting a fueling station together.”
For example, hydrogen vehicles aren’t readily available to the public and are mostly demonstration or prototype vehicles. Monroe County had access to a hydrogen vehicle, announced with great fanfare during County Executive Maggie Brooks’ state of the county address in 2008, but it was available only for test purposes and is no longer operating here.
The $5.3 million project is being added to the county’s Capital Improvement Program for 2009-14 and will take an estimated 18 to 24 months to complete. The federal share is $4.3 million and the county and city will split the remaining $1.1 million, in a breakdown yet to be determined.
Private investment in alternative fueling stations happens at a slow rate, making it difficult for public and private purchase of alternative-fuel vehicles, said Rochester Institute of Technology professor James Winebrake.
“No one is going to buy the vehicles if there are no stations around,” Winebrake said, adding that the public sector is in a better situation to take the risk of building the stations than the private sector.
In the Rochester area, there are at least four ethanol stations and a natural gas station that is run by the state Department of Transportation, Winebrake said.
The placement of the three new stations will be studied, though the city would like one on its Mt. Read Boulevard campus, Holahan said.
A $140,000 contract for engineering services related to the project is expected to be awarded to Barton & Loguidice of Rochester when the County Legislature votes on the project in December.
