Executive Speeches

Remarks of Eugene W. Zeltmann, president & chief operating officer of the New York Power Authority, at Hostos Community College, Bronx, New York.

October 16, 2001

Good morning. It’s great to be here to present this Toyota RAV4 electric vehicle to President Fernandez and Hostos Community College.

The college bears the name of a man—Eugenio Maria de Hostos who was ahead of his time in many ways and who worked—on various fronts—to improve the lives of his fellow human beings. So I think he’d be pleased that this college—his college—is in the forefront in advancing a technology that promises both to help clean our air and to reduce our dangerous dependence on foreign oil.

Today’s event is also fitting in that it builds upon the Power Authority’s valued relationship with Hostos Community College. As a member of the City University system, the college benefits from our low-cost electricity. And the energy-efficiency projects we’ve completed here provide additional savings of more than $100,000 a year on its electric bills.

And so, President Fernandez, I’m delighted to join with you in this new initiative, which I hope will help to spread the word on the college’s attributes to prospective students and the broader community. This electric vehicle will be able to go about 80 miles between battery charges, so it should work well for your admissions people and others using it. I hope, too, that the visibility of this vehicle and those used by others will help to promote interest in this clean technology and lower its costs.

The Power Authority, under Governor Pataki’s leadership, is very active in this respect. The Governor has taken numerous actions to advance electric transportation as part of his commitment to a cleaner environment for all New Yorkers. And the Authority has been involved in providing more than 200 electric and hybrid-electric vehicles of various types in its own fleet and those of its customers. These vehicles have traveled more than one million miles, making NYPA the Northeast’s first electric utility to pass that milestone.

We’re proud of that, but we’re not slowing down.

We are, for example, working with the MTA on a program to put the nation’s cleanest, most energy-efficient transit buses on the streets of New York City. Ten of these hybrid-electric buses are already in service, with another 375 to come.

Here in the South Bronx, we’ve been heavily involved in the innovative electrification project at the Hunts Point Market that will let truckers turn off their polluting engines when the trucks are stopped—without losing heat, air-conditioning and other amenities. With 32 truck stations, this will be the largest installation of its kind in the world.

Also in the South Bronx, we’ll soon begin lending a two-ton electric delivery van to area businesses on a rotating basis. I should note that we’re working on this project with Sustainable South Bronx—the community group that has also been among our partners at Hunts Point.

You know, cars and trucks account for about one-third of all the air pollution in this country. And two-thirds of all the oil we use goes to transportation. So the potential benefits of electric vehicles are clear.

The Power Authority is also working to improve the environment and reduce reliance on oil through projects like our 200-kilowatt fuel cell at North Central Bronx Hospital and our 300-kilowatt solar photovoltaic facility at the Gun Hill Bus Depot—one of the nation’s largest rooftop solar installations.

And we’re doing so through our energy-efficiency programs here and throughout the state. In the Bronx alone, these efforts save public facilities—and the taxpayers—more than $7 l/2 million a year and cut annual greenhouse-gas emissions by more than 57,000 tons.

Today, though, the focus is on this new electric vehicle. It’s now my pleasure to turn over the keys to President Fernandez. I’m sure they’ll help to open the way to many future successes for this fine institution.

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