NCTD Sustainability Case Study

Building Sustainable Transit:An Environmental Accounting Case StudyOracle Environmental Accounting and Reporting WebinarAngela K. MillerChief Technology Officer/Chief Sustainability Officer, North County Transit DistrictFred Knapp, Program Manager26-Jan-12

The North County Transit District:Building Sustainable Public Transit• North San Diego County, operating bus, commuter rail, light rail, and paratransit

systems• 107 million annual Passenger Miles Traveled• 9 million annual Vehicle Miles• 550k annual Revenue Vehicle Hours• 12.5 million trips

The North County Transit District:Building Sustainable Public Transit•A governmental agency facing extremely challenging financial conditions•Sustainability and public transit have a natural synergy – economic, social, and environmental issues are all inherently relevant to our business model•Our sustainability plan focused first on cost reductions, then capitalizing on opportunity, then building the cleanest, most scalable transportation for our community

North County Transit District:Building Sustainable Public Transit

Strategic Plan•Make capital investments where there is a priority for Sustainability and where there is economic ROI•Assess our baseline and measure ourselves against standards•Incrementally improve our performance based on economic and sustainability ROI

Methodology•Have only .25 FTE dedicated to sustainability•Business Case for Sustainability needed to be determined•Lessons from American Public Transportation Association (APTA) Sustainability Leaders •APTA Sustainability Commitment

Sustainable Public Transit Operations:Capital Investments

•Installed more than 500 kW of solar power generation capacity•Maintenance Facilities•Demonstration Projects in Rail Right-of-Way•Demonstration carport installation attached to electric vehicle charging stations at Transit Center

•Built a Green Data Center that was our first LEED Certified Silver for Commercial Interiors (registered) facility

•NCTD has converted over 85% of BREEZE bus fleet to CNG

Sustainable Public Transit Operations:Capital Investments• Working with our Communities to Foster Transit-Oriented Development

Opportunties• Integrating Sustainability Goals into Facility design, including a new Bus Transit

Center and a new Platform Extension Project

Sustainable Public Transit Operations:Simple Operational Changes

• Recycling, Lighting Changes, Equipment Operations Procedures• Health, Safety, and Wellness Policies• All cleaning – both facility and vehicle – biodegradable supplies• Bombardier Maintenance Team just achieved 5 years accident-free• Changed lighting and watering protocols

Simple Operational Changes

•Environmentally-Friendly Landscaping, Watering saves resources•Site team became engaged in the challenge to save resource•Engaging the employee and contractor teams with visible reminders

Sustainable Public Transit Operations:Assessing the Baseline

•Delivering service on the rails and the streets is our highest emissions-intensive activity•Facilities and maintenance activities contribute significantly through energy consumption, water use, and waste production•Before the sustainability plan, never measured ourselves beyond California Air and Resource Board Requirements

Environmental Accounting and Reporting:Assessing the Baseline• Wanted to measure ourselves using Industry-Standard Methodologies• Became a member of The Climate Registry and filed our first baseline year• Became a signatory to the APTA Sustainability Commitment and filed our first

annual report• In order to complete these goals, NCTD contracted with external partners like

Trust Element and Cathy Moran – significant consulting investment

Environmental Accounting and Reporting:A Case Study• NCTD realized that the manual effort to compile data was expensive and risky• Looked to existing tools investments for opportunities to improve auditability and

cost-effectiveness• NCTD has used JD Edwards for over 10 years and found a partner in Oracle to

meet our needs

Environmental Accounting and Reporting:A Case Study• Working with Team Cain, we leveraged our JD Edwards Version 9.0 investment• Had just completed both the upgrade to 9.0 and our new Human

Resources/Payroll implementation project• Both projects were highly-successful giving us the confidence to invest further in

the toolset• Implementing Environmental Accounting and Reporting Module• Also chose to invest in the Real Estate Modules

Environmental Accounting and Reporting:A Case Study

Challenges during the Project:

• Public Transit is a vehicle-focused rather than facility-focused entity. This presents challenges because most companies start at facility-level and NCTD starts at the mode of service

• NCTD is 100% outsourced for all services and maintenance. Presents challenges because the original design of the tool was based on things like inventory transactions and invoice processing

• APTA and Climate Registry present reporting requirements quite different than the native canned reports and requires import of several different and unforeseen data types

Environmental Accounting and Reporting:A Case Study

How the EA&R Product Helped to Solve the Problem:

• We needed to import from a variety of sources – achievable with these tools

• We needed custom reports tailored to The Climate Registry, APTA, and the Federal Transit Administration – the addition of the OBIEE toolset helped to overcome this issue

• We needed to streamline the data reporting – JD Edwards helped us to build this as a simple add on to core processes like invoicing

Environmental Accounting and Reporting:A Case Study•Starting Small with your sustainable operations plan is effective•Use simple changes to build business case for higher investment•Taking the time to measure results shows accountability and potentially saves resources and money•Investigating possible application for Environmental Management System•The Oracle JD Edwards Product allowed us to fit into regular accounting processes, and to save significant consulting dollars to measure efficacy