Newark, NJ To Start Replacing Diesel Garbage Truck Fleet

Newark, NJ will replace its diesel garbage trucks with compressed natural gas models, starting with the purchase of five clean energy vehicles, a city official said on June 6 at the opening of a new clean energy fueling station in Covanta Energy's waste management plant.

"Our hope is that this is going to be the first step in eventually cycling out all of our heavyweight vehicles to CNG over the next three to four years," Joel Sonkin, Newark's Chief of Energy and Environment, said at the ceremony.

The event marked the partnership of Covanta and Clean Energy Fuels Corp., which will supply the fuel to garbage trucks for municipalities and businesses in northern New Jersey and New York City. Clean Energy Fuels, which calls itself the largest provider of natural gas fuel for transportation in North America, operates one other CNG fueling station in the area, located at Newark Liberty International Airport.

Sonkin said Newark was ready to purchase the first five compressed natural gas sanitation trucks some time in the next several weeks. He said the natural gas trucks, unlike the current diesel fuel models, require less maintenance, will be more efficient, quieter, and create less pollution.

The event took place outside Covanta's Essex Resource Recovery Facility, a hulking industrial plant in Newark's East Ward that converts 2,800 tons of municipal waste a day into 70 megawatts of electricity. The facility, which serves Essex County, surrounding communities and parts of New York City, provides enough electricity to power the plant and provide enough electricity for 65,000 homes a year, company officials said.

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