New York Clean Transportation Prizes

Avoided Emissions

• Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG Emissions) are pollutants released from burning fossil and biogenic fuels. The GHG pollutants tracked in this program are carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrous oxide (N2O), and methane (CH4). Emissions are reported in metric tons of CO2 equivalents over a 20-year horizon.
• Avoided Emissions is the reduction in emissions from the use of a cleaner transportation option. Positive avoided emissions indicates an emission reduction and vice-versa. For example, if a trip is completed using an electric vehicle (EV) instead of a gasoline-powered vehicle, the avoided emissions are the difference between the emissions profiles of the two trips. If the original transportation option isn’t clear, a blended approach is used to estimate the avoided emissions.
• Electric Bicycle (e-bike) is a bicycle with an electric motor.
• Electric Vehicle (EV) is a vehicle (car, shuttle, van, truck, or bus) that can be powered by an electric motor. This term encompasses both battery electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.

Community Outreach

• Project teams are one or more organizations that were awarded a grand prize through NYSERDA’s Clean Transportation Prizes.
• Outreach Activities are carried out by project teams to engage members of the local community. For the purposes of the dashboard, there are three categories of outreach activities:
  • Broader meeting /community events are outreach events that allow project teams to promote their projects as part of larger events that have a broader focus. Examples include town hall meetings, conferences, fairs, and local events.
  • Promotional activities are outreach activities that include social media and email campaigns, canvassing, tabling, text and phone banking, and printed materials like flyers and posters.
  • Project-specific events are outreach events where project teams go deeper into their offerings and engage an audience interested in their specific project. These include community feedback sessions, roundtables, and webinars.
• Estimated people reached is the project teams’ estimated reach for each event or promotional activity. The categories include small reach (1 – 24 people), medium reach (25 – 49 people), large reach (50 – 99 people), and extra-large reach (100 or more people). There are specific outreach activities for which this information is not recorded, including broader meetings and community events, as well as certain promotional activities where it is too difficult to estimate the number of people contacted (e.g., tabling and paid media).
• Maximum estimated people reached is the highest value of the selected size category. For instance, if an event has a medium reach (25 – 49 people), its maximum is recorded as 49 people reached. The only exceptions are extra-large events (100 or more people), where the event is recorded as 100 people. For activities where the estimated people reached is unknown, the maximum estimated people reached is recorded as zero.

Disadvantaged Communities are defined by the New York State Climate Justice Working Group, criteria include relative burden associated with climate change, income, health, race, ethnicity, and housing. Projects implemented through NYSERDA’s CTP are focused on these communities.