The City of New York, with its large population increasing by the minute, must find ways to support its people while maintaining efficient use of its abundant resources. In the areas of energy and solid waste, it is not a simple task. While New York City has already been innovative in acquiring and distributing its energy sources as well as in organizing and disposing its wastes, it must implement even newer, more effective methods. PlaNYC is a project aimed towards diagnosing the city’s problems and looking for improvements to sustain a healthier, more reliable and even greater city.
The greatest obstacle in improving energy resources is the fact that the City itself is not directly in charge of its energy supply and distribution. The City still uses high-pollutant heating methods and relies on the Indian Point Energy Center for a third of its clean energy. Meanwhile, the prices of electricity are rising, and older and smaller buildings throughout the City have not yet upgraded to more efficient energy plans. To combat the obstacle, the City plans to gather individuals and private companies to work towards a common goal: cost-effective, sustainable, reliable energy. The City government plans to arrange programs and conventions in which professionals, students, and researchers alike can use public spaces to work together towards that goal. Rather than taking over companies, the City is partnering with and offering incentives to companies that can meet more energy-efficient standards. It is also supporting and investing in programs that intend to move the City towards cleaner, more dependable energy supplies.
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With a population as dense as New York City, moving materials through and out of the City can be just as hard as moving resources into and through the City. While the City is not entirely littered with trash, there are still areas in need of improvement. As the population increases, so will the waste, and consequently, the demand for space for the City’s wastes will decrease. The City’s waste disposal facilities are also far from the majority of the population, so methods of transporting waste become more costly as waste increases. Additionally, these disposal facilities emit their own wastes that negatively affect air quality when they could instead be recycled as energy. Thus, the goal for the City’s waste situation is to lessen the amount of waste produced initially, and then correctly allocate reusable materials to lessen their impact on the City. This way, trash will not increase exponentially with the population and the City can use resources to their fullest before discarding them. Opportunities to recycle and compost will be more accessible to New Yorkers and financial incentives will be available to individuals and companies alike.
These solutions come hand-in-hand. As with the energy situation, the City is not in direct control of its entire waste disposal system, so it must rely on partnerships, organizations, and encouragement. The City government sets the example for companies and individuals to follow and passes and enforces regulations and rules by which New Yorkers abide, and in that way, energy planning can improve and waste disposal methods can advance—both of which will make a cleaner, more efficient New York City.
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