Austin Lives Up to its “Green” Reputation

Those who live in Steiner Ranch are well aware of Austin’s commitment to the environment. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the capital city took the number one spot for the metropolitan area offering the best quality of live and availability of renewable energy and the number two position for the greenest metro area in a recent issue of Business Facilities magazine.

There are many reasons why Austin would be granted such a high ranking on both of these lists, with a few recent announcements helping to further illustrate why Austin is one of the “greenest” cities in the country. For example, thanks to a $198,090 grant recently received from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, thirty-one of the city’s vehicles will soon be equipped with energy-saving power generators. According to a recent Austin Biz Journals article, the City of Austin Transportation Department is already working on installing the auxiliary power units on the vehicles that are used for markings, sign and signal maintenance. These 100 volt batteries will allow workers to plug in their power tools as well as other equipment for up to eight hours without needing to keep the engine idling.

Thanks to the grant as well as the $50,000 that the city council approved to match the grant, the city will have enough funding to transform about half of its transportation fleet. The department will then evaluate the performance of these vehicles as well as the savings they incur in order to determine whether or not they should purchase enough for all of their trucks.

This isn’t the only eco-friendly change taking place in the city of Austin. In fact, the city has also recently started installing 500 solar-powered parking meters as well. This new project, which is just one aspect of the city’s comprehensive technology upgrade that started last August, is expected to be completed sometime early next week. The new meters, which will be able to accept both coins and credit cards, will replace the 3,800 single meters that are located throughout the city. Rather than replacing every single one of the old meters, however, the meters will be replace with just 700 “modern” pay stations.

The replacement devices are designed to service multiple spots at one time by dispensing tickets that can then be placed on car windows. On smaller streets and in those areas with just a few spaces, single-space, solar-powered meters will still be in use.