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Steve Fulop
Mayor | Jersey City, NJ

Resilient and Energy Efficient Municipal Infrastructure

Idea Category: Climate Change, Infrastructure

Problem

The City of Jersey City has ambitious goals for reducing GHG emissions and the use of renewable energy but has a backlog of older, inefficient municipal buildings that need to be upgraded. We also have solar arrays and EV garbage trucks, but no way of tapping into the solar power or ensuring EV charging during a disruption of the energy grid. As a coastal city facing the threat of more frequent and more severe storm events, in addition to sea-level rise, it is important to ensure that our critical infrastructure is resilient to major storm events.

Solution

The solution is to leverage the NJ Energy Savings Improvement Program (ESIP) in conjunction with other state and utility incentives to reduce operational costs, improve energy resiliency, and leverage energy savings to minimize cost on urgent capital infrastructure projects at over 20 municipal buildings. Additionally, adding battery storage to an existing generator and 1.23-megawatt solar panel array at the municipal services complex to create a microgrid that can function if the conventional grid loses power during a storm event, ensuring that the City's new electric garbage trucks can be charged.