PRT Climate Action Plan & Alternative Fuels Study

Cover page of Pittsburgh Regional Transit’s first Climate Action Plan, powered by evolveEA

Pittsburgh Regional Transit (PRT) recognizes that climate change is one of the most important challenges facing us today. Accordingly, PRT has set a goal to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2045 and evolveEA managed the agency’s first greenhouse gas emissions inventory and climate action plan (CAP) as their roadmap.

This climate action plan was developed through a 12-month collaborative process involving many PRT departments. The plan brings together existing PRT sustainability initiatives and past plans to achieve a common goal – carbon neutrality. The process was designed to produce a plan that is not only aspirational but also achievable, with the acknowledgment that PRT’s path may change as new technology develops and funding opportunities arise.

PRT Climate Action Plan ideation. Photo by evolveEA.

The plan establishes targets, goals, strategies, and actions to reduce carbon emissions from PRT’s revenue fleets, non-revenue fleets, and facilities and infrastructure. It also includes actions that do not directly reduce carbon emissions but support PRT’s ability to implement the CAP and actions that relate to sustainability more broadly.

The CAP has distilled six priority actions that will guide the next steps. As PRT’s first CAP, this document will be foundational to advance their goals and strategies, and it will be revisited regularly to reflect their progress and direct future investment.

Following completion of the CAP, PRT wanted to investigate how to reduce the 74% of their emissions that come from liquid fleet fuel. PRT has begun to purchase battery electric buses (BEBs), but decided to investigate renewable diesel as an interim approach to reduce emissions as the transition to BEBs occurs over a longer period. As part of an Alternative Fuels Study, evolveEA performed an analysis of renewable diesel in comparison to BEBs and fuel cell electric buses (FCEBs). Following the decision to pilot renewable diesel in a sample of PRT’s fleet, evolveEA developed an implementation plan for the renewable diesel pilot, including logistics, procurement process, staffing, success metrics, and timeline.