Sustainability and Resiliency Meeting Minutes - August 13, 2024
The meeting of the Sustainability and Resiliency Committee was held in the City Commission Chambers at Fargo City Hall at 3:00 p.m., Tuesday, August 13, 2024.
Present:
John Strand (chair), Fargo City Commissioner
Tim Mahoney, Fargo Mayor
Bruce Grubb, Fargo City Administration
Maegin Elshaug, Fargo Planning Department
Ben Dow, Fargo Public Works Director
Becki Majerus, Director of Facilities Management for the City of Fargo
Shawn Ouradnik, City of Fargo Inspections Director
Greta Gramig, At-Large Member of the Public
Mike Williams, At-Large Member of the Public
Zoe Absey, At-Large Member of the Public
Shawn Paschke - Xcel Energy Representative (Ex-officio)
Chad Brousseau, Cass County Electric Cooperative Representative (Ex-officio)
James Hand, Fargo School District Representative (Ex-officio)
Dave Bietz, Fargo Park District Representative (Ex-officio)
Absent:
Brenda Derrig, Assistant Fargo City Administrator
Julie Bommelman, City of Fargo Transit Director
Abhijna Kavasseri, Youth Initiative Representative
Jennifer Sweatman, At-Large Member of the Public
Casey Steele, At-Large Member of the Public
Chair Strand called the meeting to order. Introductions were done around the table.
Approval of Agenda
Mr. Grubb moved, second by Mr. Williams that the agenda be approved as read. There was unanimous approval by all members present.
June 11, 2024 Minutes Approved
Mr. Williams moved, second by Mr. Grubb that the minutes from the June 11, 2024 meeting be approved as read. There was unanimous approval by all members present.
Presentation on Prairie St. Johns Demolition – Recycling and Reuse Efforts
Matthew Sheppard, Prairie St. Johns Director of Facilities, shared a PowerPoint outlining the reuse efforts used when demolishing the former Prairie St. John’s building. He said the inpatient facility was replaced with the new behavioral health hospital built to the north that opened earlier this year. The demolition material was recycled, he said, the primary recyclable materials captured on site included concrete, masonry, asphalt and metals. He said 4,105 tons of asphalt were crushed and repurposed on site as fill, 17,462 tons of concrete/masonry were repurposed on site as fill and 1,142 tons of steel were recycled. Considerable fill was needed to bring the parking lots to an equal grade to the new building, he said, and it was a benefit to not need new materials hauled in. Crushing equipment is on site now, he said, and the pile of rebar is being separated and recycled by pulling out metal by using magnets, pinching and crushing to remove the rebar. He said only 9% of the demolished facility ended up in the landfill and 91% was recycled or repurposed. It would have taken 568 semi-truck loads to transport 22,709 tons of construction material if the recycling had not taken place, he said.
Mr. Strand said more recycling efforts like this would be beneficial and to have financial considerations or incentives could help encourage such activities. He questioned if there are practices addressing demolition recycling for the City or School District and said more should be done. He likes the idea of recycling to a new use, he stated, and this is an example of what should be done.
In response to a question from Ms. Absey about the plans for the space where the hospital building was removed, Mr. Sheppard said there will be a parking lot and green space. He said the new facility was built higher.
In response to a question from Mr. Strand asking how more of this could happen, Mr. Dow said the quality of the demolition material varies and has to be the right fit. Some older buildings have quality concrete with a lot of metal and rebar that make good recycling projects, he said.
Mr. Grubb said for example when MidAmerica Steel’s building was demolished, most of it got recycled. There were many metal buildings, which may be easier to recycle than other materials, he said.
Mr. Williams said when the Library was built some components from the original building were used, like some granite in the stairs. The foyer in the apartments by the RoCo Ramp incorporated some bricks form the old Carnegie Library. Even if it’s just a small piece, he said, it’s good to remember how things came to be and reuse them when possible.
Fargo Sustainability Roadmap – Presentation and Next Steps Discussion
Mr. Grubb said in the February meeting a high level introduction to the draft Sustainability Roadmap was presented. Recently, he met with a local reporter who did an article on efforts being done in the region and during the interview he said he struggled a bit explaining the roadmap, so following the interview he requested a narrative from HDR to accompany the graphic that would help a reader understand it. He found it useful and asked for HDR to share it with the committee today.
HDR Engineering Building Decarbonization Planning Director Seth Strongin (via conference call) said HDR has partnered with the City to conduct sustainability and resilience planning over the past year. He shared the Fargo Sustainability Roadmap that was developed. The Organization Structure roadmap is intended to provide guidance on the actions the City can take across a range of operations to achieve increasingly more sustainable outcomes through 2050., he said He explained in detail the layout and symbols on the chart and how it is broken down by categories and timeframes out to 2050.
• Infrastructure
o Water
Alternative Water Study
o Waste
Material Flow and Value Analysis
o Transit
Zero Emission Mobility Study
Zero Emission Mobility Implementation
Fleet Conversion Study
Class 3.5 Fleet Conversion Implementation
Class 6-7 Fleet Conversion Implementation
Alternative Fuel Workforce Development
Commuter Incentive Program
o Energy
Investigate LSRE PPA
Investigate onsite energy resilience
Emission-free generation
• Facilities
o Existing
Energy monitoring and benchmarking
Retro-commissioning (RCx)
Design Standards for Renovation
Procurement for Renovation
Emission reduction strategies
o New
Design and Performance Standards
Procurement Standards
In response to a question from Mr. Strand asking about implementing the infrastructure changes needed for the longer range goal of optimizing non-potable water for toilet flushing and other uses for overall water systems for the city by 2050, Mr. Strongin said it would likely involve plumbing changes. A second parallel plumbing system may be required to provide non-potable water for non-potable uses, he said, To be able to capture what would otherwise be waste water may not require dual plumbing, he said, but to use it for toilet water for flushing purposes or irrigation may require plumbing changes. He said reuse of partially treated water is used quite a bit in California and western states where there are drought considerations. There may also be code considerations, he stated.
Brian King, HDR, said the closest, most robust private use of water resource in the region is the St. Paul stadium where they do things like collect storm water for irrigation and have a water treatment system inside the building for their urinal system. On a commercial scale, he said, the Regional Water Reclamation Facility pumps potable water to Casselton for water cooling of the ethanol and soybean crushing plants.
Mr. Strongin said another area to potentially prioritize is organic waste, typically food waste. It can break down on its own, he said, and keeping it out of landfills produces usable products like compost and fillers for soil and amendments.
In response to a question from Ms. Gramig asking about prior discussions on organic waste, Mr. Grubb said the prior experience was an exercise where the City tested composting with Microsoft. He said their food service was using compostable flatware and paper plates; however, it was learned the rate of decomposition was slower than grass and leaves in the landfill. There are studies and work already done that could be examined to see if there is value that has not been implemented.
In response to a question from Mr. Strand asking whether one of the least sustainable actions is demolition of an existing structure, Mr. Strongin said replacing a structure with a new one in the conventional way involves all the waste created in demolition going to a landfill and then new materials brought to a site, so there are environmental impacts both in creation and transportation. It is almost like a double hit, he said - creating a waste stream by demolishing and an environmental footprint by building new.
Mr. Strongin said grant programs for Transit focus on zero emissions and ways to achieve goals. He said there needs to be alternatives available, especially for heavy duty pieces of equipment and there may not be many practical alternatives. It depends on emerging technology over time, he said.
Mr. Dow said the focus has been on emission reduction with the emphasis on compressed natural gas; however, large truck manufacturers are going away from that due to battery technology coming forward.
Mr. King said MetroCOG is doing a study for the electric vehicle readiness plan for the FM area and it is at a point where online public engagement will begin. He said this falls in line with some of the funding strategies outlined.
Mr. Strongin said the reach of addressing energy supply is citywide and there are options to source lower emissions, such as renewable generation, capturing waste energy and opportunities to generate energy onsite. He said significant progress can be made for carbon free electricity by 2030 and it could be possible to approach NetZero Energy by 2040. He said there are opportunities in the City’s building portfolio and there are continued funding opportunities. A first step is facility specific understanding of energy use and emissions, he said.
Mr. Williams said an example of distributed energy is in the RoCo Ramp where solar panels power battery storage and EV chargers.
Mr. Grubb pointed out that where it references EECBG on the chart, the City of Fargo has already started the process through the actions of Ms. Majerus.
Mr. Strongin reported that the other funding source, CPRG, just announced the most recent round of awards and Fargo was not awarded any funding through this round.
Mr. Strand said that is the LED conversion project there was excitement about it, so anything that can be done to resurrect that would be important and valuable.
Mr. Strongin said the information shared and all the categories in the roadmap seem a lot to absorb; however, there are many incremental steps to take and lessons that can be learned. Moving forward in emission reduction is a primary goal, he said, and is spaced out over time. There will be the need to develop new facilities and replace existing buildings over time, he said, and standards could be adopted for projects requiring certain percentages to be diverted from the landfill or energy efficiency requirements corresponding to codes. Some actions require formal City action, he said, but lessons learned can certainly be applied to everything moving forward, which will get the City to buildings that are green, sustainable and part of emissions reduction goals.
Public Comment
There were no comments from the public.
Next Meeting
Mr. Grubb announced that Youth Initiative Representative Abhijna Kavasseri will be leaving the committee and will be going to Princeton. She handled the bus wrap project and the Committee is most appreciative of her participation, he said.
The tentative date for the next meeting is October 8, 2024.
The meeting adjourned at 4:10 o’clock p.m.