Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
Apr 07, 2016
Port of Long BeachGreening and Growing
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 1
� By SAMANTHA MEHLINGER
Long Beach Business Journal
If the Port of Long Beach’s vast array of environmental initiatives were to be
traced back in lineage, their common ancestor would be the Green Port Pol-
icy in 2005. Since that time, the Port has worked both on its own and in tan-
dem with the Long Beach community, the neighboring Port of Los Angeles and
various state and federal agencies to implement policies to positively alter the
regional environment for current and future generations.
“I’m proud that the Port is going to be celebrating this year the 10th anniver-
sary of the Green Port Policy,” Mayor Robert Garcia said at the recent State of
the Port event. “I’m proud that the Port is working with the City to build a new
Port headquarters and Civic Center complex here in downtown. I’m proud that
the Port continues to lead and has listened to the call to increase internships
and opportunity for young people throughout the City of Long Beach.”
To date, the Port’s estimated contribution to green initiatives is more than
$500 million.
The policy outlines six points of focus, each with ambitious goals for reducing
the Port’s environmental impacts: Air, Water, Soils and Sediments, Wildlife, Sus-
tainability and Community Engagement. Since the Green Port Policy’s passage,
Creating A Greener Culture: The Im
2 • Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
Inside4 – Clean Trucks, Clean Air
6 – Water Quality Initiatives: Transforming
A Place Of Industry Into A Place Of Nature
8 – Green Building Standards:
Going For The Gold
10 – The Mitigation Grants Program:
Reducing Community Impacts
12 – Community Engagement:
Giving, Education And Outreach
14 – Looking Forward:
Creating An Evergreen Future
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 2
he Impacts Of The Green Port Policy
Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing • 3
the Port has gone on to establish programs in collaboration with the Port of L.A.
that expand upon the policy’s goals and go beyond mandated environmental
compliance standards. Such policies include the Clean Air Action Plan, the Clean
Trucks Program and the Water Resource Action Plan.
“Everything we touch has an environmental component. Whatever we touch,
we improve,” Port of Long Beach Chief Executive Jon Slangerup said. “Environ-
mental stewardship and economic sustainability are two sides of the same coin.”
Since the Green Port Policy was established, diesel air pollution from mobile
sources and machinery within the Port complex has been cut by 82 percent. As of
2013, smog-causing nitrogen oxide and sulfur oxide have been reduced by 54 per-
cent and 90 percent, respectively. A combination of efforts led to the massive re-
ductions, including installing infrastructure for ships to plug into clean electric
power rather than burning fuel, providing incentives for ships to slow down and
burn less fuel when approaching the Port, expanding on-dock rail capacity to reduce
the number of trucks on the road, and more. Plus, thanks to the Clean Trucks Pro-
gram passed in 2008, truck-related emissions have been reduced by 90 percent.
Water quality, too, has improved immensely. Due to consistent monitoring, an
aggressive stormwater management program and contaminated sediment re-
moval, the Port’s waters are the cleanest they have been in decades. “I am
amazed at the quality of the water,” Slangerup said, noting that when he was a
child in California, the waters were much dirtier. “This is a clean harbor.” Since
the Water Resource Action Plan was enacted in 2009, 100 percent of water qual-
ity samples taken within the Port now meet mandated standards – a 12 percent
improvement from 2009.
The Port has also invested considerable effort integrating sustainable technolo-
gies into its infrastructure. The Middle Harbor Redevelopment Project, an ongo-
ing project combining two aging terminals into one modern facility, is perhaps
the largest-scale example of these efforts. When completed, nearly the entire
terminal will run on electric, zero-emission technology, including some of the
world’s largest and cleanest cranes. “Middle Harbor is a world-class benchmark
project,” Slangerup said.
“At the end of the day, the Green Port Policy is all about the community,”
Slangerup emphasized. In addition to trying to ensure a better future for local
residents by cleaning up the environment at the Port, the Port’s outreach ex-
tends beyond its facilities and into the community via a variety of educational
and community programs. To date, the Port has awarded about $18 million in
mitigation grants to local schools and organizations to offset its impacts on
the community. �
“Everything we touch has an
environmental component.
Whatever we touch,
we improve.”
Jon Slangerup
Chief Executive
Port of Long Beach
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� By SAMANTHA MEHLINGER
Long Beach Business Journal
On October 1, 2008, the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles each
implemented programs to address the second-largest source of
air pollution (after ships) originating in the San Pedro Bay Port
complex: trucks. Within three years, the Ports’ Clean Trucks programs re-
sulted in a 90 percent reduction in air pollution from trucks, removing a sig-
nificant amount of asthma-inducing and cancer-causing particulate matter
from the air.
The policy’s key component is a staggered schedule permanently banning
older, more polluting trucks from entering the Ports. Beginning in 2008, all
trucks dated pre-1989 were banned. In 2010, all trucks made in 1993 and prior
were added to the ban, and newer trucks made between 1994 and 2003 were
required to be equipped with special technology to reduce their diesel emis-
sions. By 2012, all trucks not meeting the 2007 federal clean truck emission
standard were banned. Trucks meeting that standard emit 80 percent less air
pollution than older models.
In creating the policy, both ports and their respective cities had a primary ben-
eficiary in mind: the regional community. Former Long Beach Mayor Bob Foster,
4 • Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
Clean Trucks, Clean Air
The Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles celebrated the official grand open-
ing of the Clean Trucks Center at a press conference on August 22, 2008.
Then-Mayor Bob Foster, left, was the keynote speaker. With him is Jim Han-
kla, who was president of the Long Beach Board of Harbor Commissioners.
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 4
who held office from 2006 to 2014, emphasized that the policy is likely to have a
positive impact on population health.
“There is no doubt that the air is cleaner,” Foster said. “People are going
to be healthier as a result. There will be fewer missed days of schools, fewer
missed days of work, fewer asthma cases, and I think ultimately there will
be lower incidences of cancer,” he reflected. “This is going to benefit the
people around Long Beach in their health and in the money they spend for
health care.”
Although the policy had support in the community and in the city govern-
ments of Long Beach and Los Angeles, the road to creating the program
wasn’t without its challenges, as Foster and former Long Beach Board of Har-
bor Commissioners President Jim Hankla pointed out.
“Not everybody was for it,” Hankla recalled. “Many of the truckers weren’t
for it. They were staring at a necessity to buy a newer truck, which would have
some negative consequences for them in terms of their economics.”
Vic La Rosa, president and CEO of Long Beach-based drayage and logistics
company Total Transportation Services, Inc. (TTSI), said that initially there was
an air of uncertainty within the trucking industry regarding the proposed Clean
Trucks Program. “At the time, we really did not understand the magnitude of
the issue,” he recalled. But after he researched truck-related pollution and
cleaner technologies, he was supportive of the program. “From the very be-
ginning we have embraced the entire concept,” he said. “We were the first
company to convert our entire fleet to clean diesel and then we brought on
another 53 liquefied natural gas (LNG) trucks,” he added.
Other trucking companies and distributors followed suit, buying up trucks
meeting the 2007 standard even before the ban on previous models went into
effect, Foster recalled. La Rosa estimated that the cumulative investment in
cleaner technologies on the part of his industry was more than $1 billion.
“Over 10,000 trucks were converted. On a daily basis you see the impact of
the air quality,” he said.
Despite parting ways with the Port of Los Angeles on a labor issue – Los Angeles
wanted to include a mandate that truckers operating with its port had to be em-
ployees rather than contracted workers, which Long Beach did not support – the
Port of Long Beach forged strong bonds with its neighboring port as each devel-
oped its Clean Trucks Program, Hankla recalled.
“We really changed the world. We changed the conversation as it relates to
ports,” Hankla said. “Not only did we improve the environment in Long Beach,
but we improved the environment of ports everywhere.” �
Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing • 5
“We really changed the world. We changed
the conversation as it relates to ports.
Not only did we improve the environment
in Long Beach, but we improved the
environment of ports everywhere.”
Jim Hankla
Former President
Long Beach Board of Harbor Commissioners
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 5
� By SAMANTHA MEHLINGER
Long Beach Business Journal
Over the past 23 years, the Port of Long Beach has invested $19 million
in water quality improvement efforts ranging from stormwater
management to removing contaminated sediment, implement-
ing best management practices for pollution prevention, and revitalizing re-
gional wetlands.
The results have been manifold. Six years ago, 88 percent of all water column
samples (a sample taken from a vertical portion of a body of water) met required
standards; now, 100 percent of samples meet standard requirements. In 1998,
soon after the Port began sediment pollution abatement efforts, fewer than half
of sediment samples within the port complex met standards for levels of toxicity.
In 2013, 83 percent of samples met standards.
Additionally, the presence of the pesticide DDT and polychlorinated biphenyl,
a synthetic organic compound found in coolants, has been steadily decreasing
in mussels and fish found around the harbor area since 1980.
Thanks in large part to the Port’s investments, the Long Beach harbor is now
teeming with wildlife: sea lions, harbor seals, bottlenose dolphins, migratory
birds, peregrine falcons, seabirds, lobster and an array of fish populate the wa-
ters and land within and around the Port.
Dan Salas, owner of Harbor Breeze Cruises, a Long Beach-based company of-
fering daily wildlife harbor tours, has been an up-close witness to the improve-
6 • Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
Water Quality Initiatives:
Transforming A Place Of Industry In
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 6
Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing • 7
ments accomplished by the Port of Long Beach over the years. When Salas began
working on boats in and around the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles in 1976
when he was 12 years old, wildlife in the area was something of a rarity.
“We would catch a few fish but they were few and far between. Matter of fact,
back then we never saw a sea lion and rarely a dolphin inside the harbor,” he re-
called. At the time, it was common practice for boat captains to “pump their
wastewater right into the harbor,” he noted.
The picture Salas paints of the harbor today is very different. “The water sur-
rounding the Port of Long Beach has completely changed,” he said. Tourists
aboard Harbor Breeze Cruises regularly spot bottlenose dolphins, sea lions and
many other animals. In the past year, Salas and his team have witnessed “double
the amount of whales from the prior year right off the coast of Long Beach and
Los Angeles.” Fish and lobster have become so plentiful that recreational and
commercial fishermen are regularly fishing in the harbor, he added.
Jerry Schubel, president and CEO of the Aquarium of the Pacific, has paid close
attention to the improving habitat in local waters over the past decade or so.
“The improvement in the water quality and in marine life is quite remarkable,”
he said, attributing improvements to requirements put in place by the federal
Clean Water Act of 1972 as well as the Port’s efforts.
Port Took Lead
Fostering nature in a place dominated by industry has required strategic plan-
ning and initiatives to prevent water pollution and reverse damage done to the
aquatic environment in years past.
Even before the Port of Long Beach became known as The Green Port, it was
working to improve water quality. When provisions of the 1972 Clean Water Act
required the Port and its tenants to implement stricter stormwater control stan-
dards in 1992, the Port assumed leadership, according to Rick Cameron, manag-
ing director of planning and environmental compliance for the Port.
Port staff educated tenants about common pollutants and helped them identify
which of their business practices to alter, Cameron said. The majority of pollu-
tants entering the harbor through stormwater are metals released from brake
pads of vehicles in the Port area, as well as oil and grease from both mobile and
industrial equipment sources, according to Cameron.
In addition to educating tenants about “simple things” such as ensuring that
trash cans have lids to prevent trash from blowing into the water, the Port invested
in new infrastructure that exceeded mandated standards. At Pier G, the Port’s dry
bulk facility that regularly receives shipments of products such as petroleum coke,
coal and sulfur, the Port partnered with Metropolitan Stevedoring Company to
develop special technology to capture and prevent pollution. The result was a
1-million-gallon tank storage system to collect stormwater, treat it, and reuse it in
a sprinkling system that wets the dusty materials, thereby preventing dust and
contaminated stormwater runoff. “It is very sustainable,” Cameron said.
Recent Port investments in stormwater management infrastructure can be seen
on West Anaheim Street, where new tree planters and swales catch pollutants
before they enter storm drains.
Another primary contribution to the improvement in water quality was the
removal by the Port of contaminated sediment left behind from years of in-
dustrial activities, including by the U.S. Navy from 1943 to 1997, Cameron said.
A few years ago, the Port finished up a project to remove contaminated sedi-
ment found in former Navy-occupied areas of the Port. “We took the sediment
out of the marine environment and beneficially reused it in a sustainable way in
one of our development projects,” he explained. This practice has been used in
other sediment cleanup projects as well.
Equally important to these major investments are what Cameron called “the
simple things,” such as using street sweepers with vacuuming technology rather
than brushes and regularly keeping an eye out around the Port complex to ensure
best practices are being followed.
Since partnering with the Port of Los Angeles in 2009 to develop the Water
Resources Action Plan, which outlines the measures and programs both ports
plan to pursue to improve water and sediment quality, the Port of Long Beach
has continued to expand these programs.
Moving Forward
With billions of dollars of capital improvement projects underway at the Port
of Long Beach, Port staff has opportunities to continue integrating the latest
stormwater management technologies into its core infrastructure, Cameron em-
phasized. The Port’s environmental planning team has been working with engi-
neering staff to create design guidelines that exceed current and upcoming
mandated water quality standards, he noted.
To ensure that the Port’s achievements in improving water quality are main-
tained and further improved upon, the Harbor Department needs to work with
other city’s departments located upriver from Long Beach, Cameron said.
“It’s hard, because we could be doing a really great job spending millions
of dollars and be very diligent and responsible, but we’re talking about a
major flow of water coming down the L.A. River and Dominguez Channel into
the harbor complex,” he said. “We know that we are going to have that re-
sponsibility [to improve water quality], but then how do we make sure that
there are also metrics for improvement of the watershed that is coming
down the L.A. River? . . . We need to think about what our role is in that,
how we can help facilitate a good discussion about finding good projects
and, then, more importantly, how we can be collaborative in finding funding
opportunities.”
Cameron reflected, “We’re always looking for going beyond compliance.
That’s just built within our culture – and I think that culture changed with the
Green Port Policy.” �
ry Into A Place Of Nature
“We’re always looking for going beyond compliance.
That’s just built within our culture – and I think that
culture changed with the Green Port Policy.”
Rick Cameron
Managing Director of Planning
and Environmental Compliance
Port of Long Beach
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 7
� By APRIL ECONOMIDES
Long Beach Business Journal
When the City of Long Beach decided to adopt Leadership in En-
ergy and Environmental Design (LEED) green building standards
12 years ago, the Port of Long Beach was immediately on board.
Two years later, the Port decided to aim even higher, going above the City’s
required minimum. Today, the Port’s green development actions include 11
buildings that are either LEED Certified or awaiting certification, helping write
national guidelines for green port infrastructure, and more sustainable roads
and landscaping in areas near the Harbor District.
In March 2000, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) unveiled a certification
system for commercial, institutional and residential buildings to encourage in-
creased environmental, health and economic performance. LEED standards have
four tiers: Certified, Silver, Gold and Platinum. They can be applied to new devel-
opments or renovations. (Since 2000, the USGBC has added the additional cate-
gories of Interior Design and Construction, and Neighborhood Development.)
LEED buildings see improved employee health and performance, lower
energy and water costs, and increased building value and higher lease rates.
According to the USGBC, at least 88 of the 100 Fortune companies in the
U.S. have LEED buildings.
8 • Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
Green Building Standards: Going Fo
“One of the things I’m very
involved with is how we can
build better bridges, roads,
energy systems, waste water
treatment systems and other
types of infrastructure.”
Doug Sereno
Program Management Director
Engineering Services Bureau
Port of Long Beach
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 8
Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing • 9
The City of Long Beach adopted these USGBC standards in 2003, requiring all
new municipal buildings more than 7,500 square feet, as well as renovated mu-
nicipal buildings, to be LEED Certified. As part of its Green Port Policy develop-
ment in 2005, the Port staff decided to do more than simply comply, but to aim
higher – to go for the Gold – whenever possible.
“The Port actually helped develop the City’s ordinance,” Doug Sereno,
an engineer and the program management director for the Port who leads
the Port’s green building efforts, said. “When the city was developing it,
we participated in the meetings and indicated we would support it without
question.”
The Port currently has six LEED buildings:
• Joint Command and Control Center (Silver, completed in 2009)
• Pier G Operations Building (Gold, 2012)
• Pier G Administration Building (Gold, 2012)
• Pier G Maintenance and Repair Facility (Gold, 2012)
• Pier G West Arrivals Building (Gold, 2012)
• Maintenance Facilities (Gold, 2014)
These Middle Harbor facilities are currently seeking LEED Gold status:
• North Operations and IT Management Building
• Auxiliary Maintenance Facility
• Marine Operations Building
• Power/Crane Maintenance Shop
• South (Main) Administration Building
In addition, the Port’s future administration building will be located in the
Long Beach Civic Center development, which is aiming for LEED Platinum. “If
we can get to Platinum, we want to always do that,” Sereno said.
One of the main green construction practices the Port employs is reusing dem-
olition materials from one project to another. This not only saves money but re-
sults in fewer trucks on the 710 Freeway since new materials don’t need to be
trucked in. Other green practices include optimizing water and energy use, using
cleaner fuels in construction equipment, improving indoor air quality, and plant-
ing drought-tolerant landscaping.
In talking about the Middle Harbor’s maintenance building, currently awaiting
Gold certification, Sereno said, “What’s unusual here is that we’re achieving Gold
levels with a maintenance building, not an office building. Maintenance buildings
aren’t normally rated with the LEED system because it’s more difficult with open-
air buildings, which have more energy loss. But we were able to design it with a
certain level of efficiency. We’ve accomplished something really unique.” The ef-
ficiencies include cooling and heating vents near employee work-
stations (versus, for example, on the ceiling), and a 375-kilowatt
solar photovoltaic system on the roof, expected to provide 15 per-
cent of the building’s energy.
“One of the things I like the most about our maintenance building,
though, is the xeriscaping (drought-tolerant plants) and bioswales
(natural stormwater filtration) we included,” Sereno said. “It shows
how you can be good, do good and look good all at the same time.”
The Port is also breaking new ground with green infrastruc-
ture. “One of the things I’m very involved with is how we can
build better bridges, roads, energy systems, waste water treat-
ment systems and other types of infrastructure,” Sereno said.
“We’ve been involved in the Envision [sustainable infrastruc-
ture] rating system – it’s a corollary with LEED. Horizontal infra-
structure is the next big horizon.”
One of the Port’s projects is the construction of the replacement
for the Gerald Desmond Bridge, which will include a 12-foot-wide
separated bike and pedestrian path on the south side of the
bridge, with three overlook areas.
Under Sereno’s leadership, the Port developed its own sustainabil-
ity guidelines for infrastructure since few precedents existed. The
American Association of Port Authorities ended up using the Port’s
guidelines as the basis for its West Coast Ports Sustainable Design
and Construction Guidelines. Sereno said an example of green infrastructure is
reusing the asphalt and concrete from a terminal demolition.
“Back in 2005, when we did the whole Green Port Policy, I didn’t know anything
about what sustainability was,” Sereno said. In 2014, Sereno was appointed the
chair of the American Society of Civil Engineers’ sustainability committee.
The Port is also involved in road infrastructure projects outside of its Harbor District
that are heavily traveled by trucks coming to and from the Port. Lee Peterson, media
relations specialist for the Port, said, “West Anaheim Street had some of the worst
roads, largely because there are many cargo trucks that take a toll on the pavement.”
To remedy this, the Port partnered with the City’s public works department on
the West Anaheim Street Improvement Project. The City contributed the new
street design and some of the financing.
“Instead of just repaving,” Peterson said, “it was an opportunity to add in
things like landscaping, new and widened sidewalks and crosswalk timers. Be-
cause the Port has a goal of improving areas to not only be utilitarian but also
sustainable, we worked with the City to install LED street lights to save on elec-
tricity and a traffic monitoring system that’s built right into the roads so the
lights adjust with traffic levels.”
The new landscaping, which includes drought-tolerant plants and bioswales,
requires less maintenance and water, thereby saving taxpayers’ money.
“West Anaheim Street is now a better entry way for people coming into Long
Beach from the west,” Peterson said. “Maybe folks will be more likely to stop now
and spend money at the businesses along that route.” �
ng For The Gold
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 9
� By APRIL ECONOMIDES
Long Beach Business Journal
In 2009, the Long Beach Board of Harbor Commissioners approved the
Port’s Community Mitigation Grants Program to mitigate air pollution pro-
duced from new development in the Port. Although the Port is construct-
ing very “green” buildings and infrastructure – its new buildings adhere to U.S.
Green Building Council standards and the Port is helping write green guidelines
for the Envision Sustainable Infrastructure Rating System – its new develop-
ments still have cumulative negative air impacts. This grant program helps miti-
gate those impacts and prioritizes funding in the communities hit hardest by
Port activities, namely near the 710 Freeway and in West Long Beach.
“The Community Mitigation Grants Program has been one of the most in-
novative and rewarding ways in which the Port of Long Beach has reduced
air pollution impacts while partnering with worthy community organiza-
tions and other city departments,” Doug Drummond, president of the Board
of Harbor Commissioners, said. “We’ve made grant awards for asthma vans,
air filters in grade school classrooms, electric cars, solar panels and many
other technologies that will not only reduce pollution but save money in
the long run for the grant recipients.”
The program awards grants under three categories: schools and related
sites; health care and senior facilities; and greenhouse gas (GHG) emission re-
duction. Projects that reduce GHG emissions, such as the solar installations,
10 • Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
The Mitigation Grants Program: Re
Rick Cameron is the managing director of Planning and Environmental
Compliance for the Port of Long Beach, and Heather Tomley is the Port’s
Director of Environmental Planning.
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:51 PM Page 10
electric vehicles and native gardens, demonstrate the most measurable cost sav-
ings from reduced energy, water and garden maintenance costs. Diseases caused
by air pollution also have a price tag both in dollars and in reduced quality of life.
Most of the grants to schools fund air filtration units at grammar schools, day
care centers and park facilities with kids’ programming, to help remove harmful
pollutants that cause asthma and other ailments. Funding to health care facilities
also funds air filters, and money given to senior centers provides diagnostic equip-
ment for asthma and cardiopulmonary illnesses.
Nearly $18 million has been awarded to date – just under $15 million in 2010
and 2011 from the Middle Harbor Redevelopment Project and nearly $3 million
in 2013 from the Gerald Desmond Bridge Replacement Project.
Project selections were made by an advisory committee comprised of three mem-
bers of the public selected by former Long Beach Mayor Bob Foster, representatives
from the California Air Resources Board and South Coast Air Quality Management
District and representatives of the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association. The com-
mittee made recommendations to staff, and staff brought the recommendations to
the Board of Harbor Commissioners for approval. Christine Houston, manager of
sustainable practices for the Port, said that in keeping with the Port’s commitment
to transparent community engagement, the whole process was very transparent.
Because grant funding is linked to the impacts of specific development projects,
new funding becomes available after a project is approved and permitted. If the
Pier B Rail Yard Project is approved without opposition, which would happen in
2016 or 2017, the Port will solicit for grant projects shortly thereafter. �
Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing • 11
m: Reducing Community Impacts
“The Community Mitigation Grants
Program has been one of the most
innovative and rewarding ways in which
the Port of Long Beach has reduced
air pollution impacts while partnering
with worthy community organizations
and other city departments.”
Doug Drummond
President
Long Beach Board of
Harbor Commissioners
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 11
� By APRIL ECONOMIDES
Contributing Writer
The Port of Long Beach’s Green Port Policy has six pillars and, according
to Rick Cameron, managing director of planning and environmental com-
pliance, the most important is Community Engagement. The other five
– Wildlife, Air, Water, Soils/Sediment and Sustainability – cannot be genuinely
achieved, he said, without a firm foundation of public involvement.
“The Green Port Policy wasn’t just a policy but a culture change,” Cameron said.
“It imbedded environmental commitment and transparency throughout the or-
ganization and changed how we engage with the public.” It also rebranded the
Port’s identity to “The Green Port.”
The Pier J South project – which was put on hold in 2003 due to air quality and
other concerns – was the turning point. “It was the pivotal fork in the road,”
Cameron said. “It highlighted how our responsibility stretches far outside the con-
fines of the Port to the Greater Long Beach community – and it changed how
we’d go on to develop future projects. We took a timeout. We had to figure out
how to really open up our doors and engage with the community.”
Cameron believes the Port has established a foundation of trust. “There’s no
agency that contacts the Port and doesn’t get the straight story or have the ability
to come into the Port and get the information they need,” he said. “We may agree
to disagree on issues, but it’s not a question of transparency.”
12 • Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
Community Engagement: Giving, Ed
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 12
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Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing • 13
Toward that end, the Port reports on its progress via its website, social media,
press conferences and community events. At last week’s State of the Port event,
it announced its intention to become the world’s first zero emission port.
Middle Harbor was the first project that embodied the Port’s new way of ana-
lyzing environmental impacts and building trust with multiple stakeholders. “The
project has really good mitigation, but we went beyond that,” Cameron said. “It’s
partially because community and environmental groups said, ‘That’s great for 10
years from now, but what about today?’”
This prompted the Port to expand its charitable giving so the community also
receives immediate benefits. In addition to its Green Port initiatives and improved
community engagement (not to mention supporting more than 30,000 jobs
within Long Beach – one-eighth of the city’s jobs – generating $5.6 billion a year
in state and local tax revenues and bringing consumers an array of goods from
other countries), the Port now contributes approximately $1 million a year to
Long Beach schools, charitable organizations and community events.
The Port’s community investments reach all nine Long Beach City Council
Districts and seemingly every type of cause, including the Veterans Day Parade,
Long Beach Marathon, Regional Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, health ef-
forts, historic preservation, the arts, social justice organizations, community
festivals and many more. The Port also makes possible the summertime
Movies on the Beach and Concerts in the Park.
Michael Gold, director of communications and community relations, said, “The
Port is an integral part of the community fabric. We work here, we live here and
we love the city. We also recognize we have a big impact on the community, so we
contribute through signature events and grassroots community efforts.”
The Port’s outreach also involves educating the community about the eco-
nomic benefits of the Port and international trade in general. As part of this
effort, the Port offers four harbor tours a month (April-October) and regularly
has tables at community events.
It also engages Long Beach public school students. To ensure that as many Port-
related jobs as possible go to Long Beach high school and college graduates, the
Port has awarded nearly $500,000 in scholarships to Long Beach-area high school
seniors and college students pursuing a career in international trade since 1993.
The high school scholarships are $1,000 to $8,000 each.
In addition, the Port offers 25 internships a year to high school seniors and 20 to
college students. “The unique thing about the high school internships is they’re all
paid,” Gold said. “And we’re responding to the mayor’s call to double the number
of internships within the next two years, both at the Port and in the community.”
The best example of the Port’s integration into local education is probably
its influence on school curricula. In partnership with the Long Beach Unified
School District, the Port developed lesson plans for middle and high school
classes. Using real-life port examples, students learn how algebra, geometry,
physics and economics are part of international trade. For example, the video
“Julio’s New Ride,” created for 12th grade economics students, illustrates how
teenagers around the world are connected by international products, like
Japanese-made cars and American-made sneakers. �
“The Port is an integral part of the community fabric.
We work here, we live here and we love the city.”
Michael Gold
Director of Communications
and Community Relations
Port of Long Beach
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 13
� By SAMANTHA MEHLINGER
Long Beach Business Journal
As the Port of Long Beach celebrates the 10th anniversary of its Green
Port Policy, Chief Executive Jon Slangerup is marking the start of a new
era for the Port with a far-reaching and ambitious plan to operate at
zero emissions on a self-sustained grid of energy-generating infrastructure – a
concept he calls Energy Island.
“Our concept of Energy Island is an opportunity to install a fully integrated, grid-
connected self-generation of energy using all forms of the latest proven technolo-
gies,” Slangerup said. That means the Port would need to generate enough energy
to meet its peak demand, which equates to about 300 megawatts. The Port’s
needs, combined with those of the Long Beach community, make up 11 percent
of the demand for energy from Southern California Edison, Slangerup noted.
The goal is for the Port, using the cleanest and greenest technologies, to be able
to generate enough of its own energy to remain operational during a catastrophic
event, Slangerup explained. He hopes to meet that goal within the next 10 years.
Although the word “island” implies isolation, that isn’t the case, Slangerup em-
phasized. The Port wouldn’t be disconnected from Southern California Edison’s
energy grid – quite the contrary. “We want to send all of our surplus energy, all
green, into the grid,” he said. Ideally, in the event of a disaster the Port would
also be able to sustain key city services such as fire, police and even hospitals.
14 • Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing
Looking Forward: Creating An Ev
“We have got so many
exciting things to do yet
that will get us closer to our
ultimate goal, which is becoming
the zero emission Port.”
Jon Slangerup
Chief Executive
Port of Long Beach
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:35 PM Page 14
Green
a new
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ercent
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be able
rophic
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up em-
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Port of Long Beach Greening and Growing • 15
In addition to experimenting with emerging technologies, the Port as an Energy
Island will be powered by proven technologies such as wind turbines, solar pan-
els, fuel cells and natural gas, Slangerup said.
Wind turbines are perhaps the largest of these infrastructures, as many are
typically needed to generate enough energy to make a dent in supply. So
where would they go? “I see wind turbines dotting the landscape in the water
out by the breakwater, where, by the way, the wind regime is excellent,”
Slangerup said.
Solar panels are already present throughout the Port on its newest buildings
and, as the Port continues to expand and update its infrastructure, more will be
installed, Slangerup said.
Creating a grid of stationary fuel cells, devices that convert chemical energy
from fuel into electricity, is a newer venture for the Port. Unlike batteries, fuel
cells are able to continuously generate power as long as they have a supply of
natural gas, a clean source of fuel.
In addition to powering the Port with fuel cells, Slangerup envisions creating
natural gas fueling depots for a new class of dual fuel ships visiting the Port. Dual
fuel ships are able to run on traditional fuels, like diesel, in addition to the cleaner
liquefied natural gas. “We have customers that currently have dual fuel ships al-
ready being retrofitted that call regularly on our Port,” Slangerup said. He hopes
to begin creating fueling stations for these ships within the Port complex in 2016.
In envisioning the Port as an Energy Island, Slangerup did not neglect another
consideration for weathering disasters – a source of clean water. “Energy Island
also includes desalination plants so we have clean water being generated with
our own self-sustaining energy source so that even in a catastrophic outage of
the grid we can still be providing water to the citizens,” he said.
Creating the self-sustaining infrastructure Slangerup envisions is likely to come
with a big price tag, but he is confident the Port will have a variety of funding
sources available. “This opens up a whole different set of opportunities around
funding, because if you think about Energy Island from a homeland security per-
spective, and given that we are a designated military port . . . suddenly the game
changes,” he said. In addition to seeking funding from “the usual suspects,” the
Port may have access to grants from the U.S. departments of Homeland Security,
Defense, Energy and even the Environmental Protection Agency, he speculated.
“I would like to have the project team in place in 2015 to move this forward.
And in late 2016 or fiscal year 2017, I would actually like to be installing the in-
frastructure in the first phase,” he said.
Investing In New Technologies
As the Port moves ahead with Slangerup’s ambitious Energy Island plan, it
will continue to invest in clean technologies for use in and around the Port via
the Technology Advancement
Program (TAP), a joint effort
with the Port of Los Angeles.
Since its establishment in
2007, TAP has provided about
$3 million in funding towards
innovations every year.
Two current projects the
ports have contributed funding
to through TAP are poised to
address the largest sources of
pollution within the harbor
complex: ships and trucks.
Although the Port is working
to implement shore power for
ships to plug into, rather than
burning fuel while at berth,
not all vessels are going to be
good candidates for shore
power, Port of Long Beach Di-
rector of Environmental Plan-
ning Heather Tomley pointed
out. Some ships serve a trade
route that includes ports with-
out the stringent restrictions
placed on air emissions in Cal-
ifornia, and for that reason
their owners may not want to
invest in cleaner technology.
To address these ships, a new
Advanced Maritime Emissions
Control System (AMECS) is in development, partially thanks to funding from
the TAP program.
“The AMECS is on a barge, and it has got this duct system that connects to
the exhaust stack of a vessel. It routes all of the emissions into a system that
is on the barge, and treats the emissions right there,” Tomley said. With AMECS
barges able to go out to ships not only within the Port but at anchor in the
harbor, theoretically all emissions from ships coming into the local ports could
be captured, Slangerup said.
AMECS is “inches away from the goal line in terms of full certification,”
Slangerup said. “We are now working out how the Port can support the AMECS
technology to the commercial stage,” he added.
To address pollution created by trucks, TAP is contributing funding to a test run
of new technology that runs on an overhead catenary system to electrically
power trucks. A single mile test-strip of the system outfitted with overhead wires
for electric and hybrid trucks is in the permitting stages, Tomley said.
The system would work by outfitting electric-compatible trucks with a movable
pantograph system – technology that lifts up when underneath the catenary sys-
tem to touch the wires and access electric power, she explained. Ideally the sys-
tem would allow trucks to use zero emission electric power over longer distances,
which is sometimes difficult with limited battery power.
Slangerup reflected, “We have got so many exciting things to do yet that will
get us closer to our ultimate goal, which is becoming the zero emission Port.” �
An Evergreen Future
PortAnniversaryFinal_PortAnniversary 2/2/15 5:36 PM Page 15
Port of Long Beach
www.polb.com