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Air Quality and Solid Waste Divisions, and
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Utilities Mecklenburg Utilities
Sponsored by the
Environmental Assistance Office (EAO) for
Small Business at UNC Charlotte, The Environmental Corner
is designed to serve as an environmental
management and pollution prevention resource
March 2007
Your Business Can Take Air Quality Action
Your business can work to make a difference in the
quality of air that we breathe! Clean air is vital
for our health, the environment, and the economy.
Air quality is affected by the gases and chemicals
released by man-made sources such as factories,
power plants, vehicles, and machinery. The reactions
of nitrous oxide
and volatile organic carbon (VOC) gases in the atmosphere with heat from the
sun are the main causes of ground level ozone. In
the Charlotte region nitrous oxide
gases
are primarily caused by
mobile sources (97%), while 90% of VOC gases are contributed
mainly with natural biogenics sources. You can make
a difference in the contributions by mobile source
emissions by changing behavior. This newsletter will
provide information on how your business can take
air quality actions!
How Your Business Can
Take Air Quality Action
Attend Spring Training Workshop (Tuesday,
March 27, 2007)
Mecklenburg County Air Quality (MCAQ)
is having a spring workshop on March 27th,
8:00 AM to 12:00 PM at
CPCC
Harper Campus, Room 108, 315 Hebron Street,
Charlotte, NC 28217.The
goal of this workshop is to provide air quality
permitting training to help you better understand
MCAQ’s permit application forms, permitting process,
emission calculation methods, and more. Contact
Sheila Murphy at (704) 336-5500 or
sheila.murphy@mecklenburgcountync.gov [More
Information]
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Sponsor A Gas Cap Check
Leaking vehicle gas caps can contribute to air
pollution and waste fuel and money due to
evaporation.
MCAQ provided gas cap testing units to rotate
between forty five volunteering NC inspection
stations. Fifteen stations will be testing caps each
quarter in 2007,
January
[schedule]
through September. If a vehicle's gas cap
fails, a new one will be provided free of charge.
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Sponsor a Gas Cap Check for your company!!
Schedule the Mecklenburg
County Air Quality team to test your company
fleet and employees gas caps. Contact Alan Giles
of Mecklenburg Co Air Quality at (704)336-5836
or
Alan.giles@mecklenburgcountync.gov
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Go to the gas cap testing inspection station for a free
test.
Some facts on leaking gas caps:
-
Leaking gas caps contribute to air pollution and
waste fuel due to evaporation. According to the
US Car Care Council estimates, 17% of vehicle
gas caps are either damaged or missing allowing
147 million gallons of gasoline to vaporize
every year.
-
Gas caps can leak regardless of the age of the
vehicle (higher if vehicle is more than 3 yrs
old)
-
Every leaking gas cap = approximately 200 pounds
of evaporative emissions per year (0.1 tons of
VOCs)
-
Thirty gallons of gasoline can be released
annually from a leaking gas cap.
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Participate in Clean
Air Works!
It’s simple! Join
with other businesses in our region.
Sign up with Clean Air Works!
and your worksite will be assigned an outreach
coordinator who will help you establish baseline
measures of operations and commuting behavior, and
create a customized program to meet your specific
needs.
Clean Air Works!
is a project of the Regional Air Quality Board that
has partnered with leading employers in the
Charlotte region to create voluntary programs that
improve air quality. The project was created in
collaboration with the Regional Planning Alliance,
the City of Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, Charlotte
Area Transit System (CATS), the Charlotte Chamber of
Commerce, the Centralina Council of Governments, and
the Catawba Regional Council of Governments.
What Clean Air Works! Can Do For You
We’ll work with you every step of the way to make
sure your program is successful – and makes a
difference in the air we breathe.
Clean Air Works!
staff partners
with employers
– one-on-one
and free of charge – to design and implement
customized air quality improvement programs.
Services include:
•
Worksite assessments and customized plans
•
Transportation fairs, Try-It days & Meet Your Match
events
•
Air quality education
•
Internal & external marketing tools
•
Incentive ideas & development
For more
programs and information
For more details, please visit
www.cleanairworks.org, or contact Gabe Workman
at 704-716-0754 or
Gabe_Workman@URSCorp.com
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Participate in NC
Air Awareness
The
mission of
N.C. Air Awareness is to increase public
knowledge and understanding of air pollution, its
causes, effects, and how it can be prevented.
The Air Awareness program is designed to motivate
individuals and organizations to take voluntary
action to reduce their contribution to air
pollution, particularly on poor air quality days.
Through distribution of the air quality forecast,
Air Awareness also seeks to keep Carolinians
informed of potential health impacts on poor air
quality days.
If you would like to help
prevent Air Quality Action Days (days that exceed
National Ambient Air Quality Standards) and provide
healthy air to all North Carolinians, your business
can join the coalition.
By
becoming an Air Awareness Business Coalition
member, employers are making a commitment to their
employees to stay informed about the air quality
conditions, especially on Action Days when air
pollution exceeds federal health standards.
Coalition members agree to distribute the Air
Quality Forecast to employees and are encouraged to
voluntarily adopt commuter programs or make
operational changes that will help improve regional
air quality. To join the Air Awareness
Business Coalition, or to sign up for the forecast,
please contact Megan Green at 704-336-5500 or
Megan.Green@MecklenburgCountyNC.gov
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Encourage Employees to
change habits!!
1.Ride public
transportation 4.Car pool
2.Telecommute (with supervisor approval) 5.Bike
3.Eat lunch on
campus 6.Walk
More Workplace Action Tips!
Information
Use CATS-Charlotte Area Transit System
The
Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS) has made
significant strides in lowering vehicle emissions
and promoting environmental stewardship in its
operating practices since its inception.
Since 1997, the transit system has conducted an
annual “Clear the Air” campaign during the heavy
Ozone season. This annual program includes radio,
billboard and newspaper messages on the issues of
ground level ozone. Numerous transportation fairs
are conducted with local businesses encouraging
employees to carpool, especially on Ozone Action
Days. CATS coordinates the Clear the Air Program to
promote alternative methods of transportation within
the region from May to September each year.
Better
way to commute:
CATS a better way to commute, it is also a smarter
way to commute because it helps reduce ozone
pollution and traffic congestion. Visit following
site for more CAT services click
here
for
CATS schedule.
Share the ride :
Carpooling or vanpooling is one of the great
way. Friends sharing same office hours or going to
same market place can share their ride. Hence
reducing traffic and Air Pollution [More
info]
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Case Study;
UNC
Charlotte Air Quality Action
UNC
Charlotte takes a leadership role in improving air
quality in the Charlotte region with the
implementation of an initiative from Chancellor
Dubois. An Air Quality Action Strategy Team for the
UNC Charlotte campus was established last year by
Dr. Wayne Walcott, Vice Chancellor of Academic
Affairs, and is comprised of administrative
officials, faculty, staff, graduate and
undergraduate students. With the assistance of
Mecklenburg County Land Use and Environmental
Services (LUESA) – Air Quality Division, the UNC
Charlotte Air Quality Action team developed plans to
implement educational outreach, air quality forecast
notification, and action strategies on campus with
the goal of taking actions to help the Charlotte
region meet air quality standards. The Environmental
Assistance Office (EAO) of the UNC Charlotte Global
Institute of Energy and Environmental System (GIEES)
staff has provided guidance and direction for the
program.
UNC Charlotte had one of the
largest numbers of employees tracking their
commutes summer 2006, with the most diverse
travel patterns recorded. The majority of UNC
Charlotte employees who tracked their commutes
carpooled to work or took transit during the
summer; however, there were also significant
numbers of bicyclists, walkers, and a few
commuters who teleworked. Through clean
commuting, participants eliminated 45,154
vehicle miles from area roads. “Thanks to Clean
Air Works! we noticed enhanced awareness to
issues affecting air quality and how to make
individual choices that when united with the
Charlotte community create an overall
enhancement of the air we breathe,” Wayne A.
Walcott, Senior Associate Provost, University of
NC at Charlotte.
Clean Air Works! Case Study, 2006.
Kick Off and
Transportation Fair
The Air
Quality Action Strategy was launched with an ice
cream social, where over 200 employees accepted the
invitation to enjoy delicious ice cream, learn more
about air quality issues, public transportation, and
what they can do to help improve air quality. Ms.
Regina Guyer, Director of the Environmental
Assistance Office, led a game of Air Jeopardy in
which employee teams played against each other,
showing their knowledge of air quality issues.
Presentations were also made by Ms. Megan Greene of
the NC Air Awareness Campaign to highlight the
problems associated with ozone and poor air quality.
Clean Air Works! presented the results from the UNC
Charlotte employee survey and discussed the
university’s plan to conserve energy and improve air
quality. Ms. Crystal Green of the Charlotte Area
Transit System (CATS) also presented the various
options for utilizing mass transit in Charlotte.
Additionally, there were booths by various campus
and state-wide groups to educate employees on
environmental issues.
Clean
Air Works! representative, Gabe Workman, shared with UNC Charlotte
employees about the Clean Air Challenge.
 
A
transportation fair and gas cap check was held on
March 1, 2007 to provide more air quality
information, check for leaking gas caps, and
collaborate for car pools, CATS, motorized bicycles,
and other alternative strategies of transportation
for employees. There were 74 vehicles checked and
six gas caps replaced which will prevent 1200 pounds
of air pollutants from being released to the
atmosphere.
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of page
The Environmental Assistance Office for Small
Business provides non-regulatory,
client-confidential pollution prevention assistance
to small businesses in the greater Charlotte region.
The EAO is designed to assist regional businesses in
their efforts to voluntarily prevent pollution. The
EAO staff can provide timely assistance for
pollution prevention planning, including information
about industry-specific case studies, waste-specific
case studies, and new technologies. The office
provides links of resources to needs between the
region's business community, government,
municipality, and university. If there is a
particular issue or question you would like to see
in an upcoming edition, please send an e-mail to
EAOforSB@email.uncc.edu
Contact Information:
Environmental Assistance Office for Small Business:
9201 University City Blvd. 258 Cameron Building, UNC
Charlotte, Charlotte, NC 28233-0001
Phone number: 704-687-3968 Fax number: 704-687-3115
Email:
EAOforSB@email.uncc.edu
Services:
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Assistance with Air Permits - Assistance for
small businesses in completing paperwork for EPA
air permits.
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Educational Materials - Educational pamphlet,
brochures, flyers, and other materials to relate
facts on pollution prevention.
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Educational Outreach - Develop educational
outreach campaigns and presentations for the
public or employee training.
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University Resources - Library information,
faculty expertise, student projects and research
at both graduate and undergraduate levels.
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