Summer 2009
EEA, Inc.
55 Hilton Avenue,
Garden City, New York 11530
(516) 746-4400, (212) 227-3200
(800) 459-5533
additional New York offices:
Stony Brook
(631) 751-4600
Albany
(518) 573-7222
Asheville, NC
(828) 777-0610 |
e-mail addresses:
General:
mailto:eea@eeaconsultants.com
Individual:
First initial and last name
@eeaconsultants.com
EEA services include
Phase I ESAs, Haz-Mat
Testing and Remediation, Wetlands
Delineation and Creation, Natural
Resources Inventories,
Marine Ecology Studies,
Air Quality and Noise
studies, and Environmental Management
System (ISO 14000) implementation.
Visit our web site
at
http://www.eeaconsultants.com/
For information or quotes,
contact:
EEA, Inc. –
Founded in 1979
Principals
Leland M. Hairr, Ph.D.
President
Allen Serper, M.S., P.E.
Vice President
Roy R. Stoecker, Ph.D.
Vice President
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One of the newer technologies developed overseas and
trying to make inroads into North America is the automated parking
garage. An alternative to both valet parking and self-parking,
with an automated garage, the driver enters the facility’s staging
area, driving just a short distance before stopping and turning off
the engine. From there robotic platforms automatically convey the
vehicle to a designated parking space.
When the driver returns, the process is reversed with
the vehicle conveyed back to the staging area, where the driver
starts the engine and exits the garage.
Because the automated system involves much less
driving within the garage, vehicular emissions should be greatly
reduced, resulting in some quantifiable benefits to both air
quality and fuel consumption. The
U.S. Green Building Council crafted the
Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), a green
building rating system that has been implemented
internationally to promote green building design,
construction, operations and maintenance solutions. The LEED
Certification Program allows for independent evaluations to verify
if a building meets the green building standards. Automated
parking garage systems have been applied successfully to LEED
building designs.
The LEED rating system is based on achieving a
certain number of points. The Automated System can give a project
up to 12 LEED points.
EEA worked with
Simmatec’s automated parking garage system to quantify the
vehicle emissions this past year. EEA compared the potential
emissions and fuel consumption impacts of an automated parking
garage to those of a conventional (manual)
parking garage. Although the
procedures in the analysis were for a
representative garage in New York City, the results should be
comparable for garages in other metropolitan areas.
Emissions were estimated for vehicle travel
within a 350-space manual parking garage versus a 350-space
automated garage.
The specific pollutants of concern were
carbon monoxide (CO), volatile organic compounds (VOC),
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Lift System in Automated Garage |
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nitrogen oxides (NOx), and
carbon dioxide (CO2), a “greenhouse” gas of
concern with respect to global warming. In addition,
gasoline and diesel fuelconsumption
was also evaluated.
Parking garage emissions and fuel
consumption were determined based on the hourly volumes of
entering and exiting vehicles, the distance traveled, the
average
speed, and the amount of idling time.
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Tower mobilizes vehicles within the
Garage |
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USEPA factors were used to determine the
emission and fuel consumption rates for the parking
facilities.
The hourly and daily pollutant emissions
and fuel consumption for the manual and automated garages
were then determined. The annual reductions, shown in the
table below, were estimated by multiplying the daily
values by 365 days per year. As can be seen, the
automated garage results in a much lower level of
emissions and fuel usage. |
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