Two broad materials management strategies are explored here: dealing with particular materials that are high priority because they have either high global warming potential or high potential to sequester greenhouse gasses, and dealing overall with the materials management system to achieve deep emissions reductions and orient the system towards zero waste operations and a circular economy.

Priority Materials: Refrigerants, Building and Structural Materials, Organics

Refrigerants 

Many of the refrigerants in use today are powerful greenhouse gases, an invisible source of air pollution with global warming potentials hundreds or thousands of times more powerful than carbon dioxide. HFCs, which are used for cooling and refrigeration, as well as for foams, solvents and fire suppressants, comprise 6% of the state’s greenhouse gas inventory. Because these gases are in ever-widening circulation as heat pumps become the dominant mode of heating and cooling, New York and the Hudson Valley will not be able to reach their short- or long-term climate goals without addressing HFCs.  This has been recognized in the Scoping Plan, which says: 

NYSERDA, DPS, and DEC should coordinate to develop incentives such as utility rebates and grant programs to support the adoption of natural refrigerants in food stores. Incentives are particularly needed to fund a substantial portion of the installation of new equipment in existing stores in Disadvantaged Communities or stores operated by independent companies or small chains, to enable food stores to phase out HFCs without impacting LMI consumers or negatively affecting food security. 

There is also a need for leak prevention and repair support for food establishments  that use large-scale refrigeration. Only about one-third of NY supermarkets have automatic leak detection systems, which have been proven over the years in the EPA’s voluntary GreenChill Program to cut leak rates in half. If a full-size grocery store spends $14,000 to $16,000 on this equipment and reduces its overall leak rate by 10%, the investment pays for itself through reduced refrigerant costs while avoiding CO2 equivalent emissions of 780,000 to 1.3 million pounds each year thereafter. NYSERDA should create a program to support these investments with financial and technical assistance for food establishments in Disadvantaged Communities and for stores operated by independent companies or small chains. 

The Scoping Plan also discusses Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) programs for many products, including refrigerant-containing appliances and refrigerants themselves. Under an EPR program, the producers of a product are responsible for all elements of the product from cradle to grave, which incentivizes them to design for safe reuse or dismantling into useful components and capturing problematic elements at the end of a product’s life. 

An EPR for refrigerants would primarily focus on greater rebate incentives for HVAC contractors who should already be recovering refrigerants in following industry best practices and EPA regulations (but frequently do not because of the time and trouble involved).

An EPR for appliances would primarily focus on getting refrigerant-containing consumer appliances (such as window air conditioners and refrigerators) into the hands of qualified recyclers, who will recover the refrigerants before recycling the other scrap metals and materials in the appliances.  At present the overwhelming majority of these appliances go directly to landfill or are handled by scrap metal collectors who frequently vent the refrigerants when they harvest the scrap metals that they get paid for. Because these appliances have the most intensive greenhouse gases of anything in New York’s waste stream, an EPR program for these appliances should be prioritized by the waste community in NYS and advocated by the region; it would be fiscally prudent for New York to work with the producers of these products to fund future refrigerant management efforts.

Workforce development efforts are greatly needed in order to have satisfactory numbers of trained personnel who can scale up heat pump adoption in residential and commercial buildings and who can install and maintain state-of-the-art refrigeration equipment in food establishments. All of these new workers will also need to be prepared to maintain legacy equipment in an industry that is working through significant changes.

A strategy for building awareness of refrigerant issues and showing what can be accomplished by pure people-power is the community refrigerant capture event.  Red Hook began this in the Hudson Valley in partnership with Bard College, training a group of skilled volunteers to withdraw and recycle the refrigerant in each week’s dropped off refrigerators, air conditioners and other appliances. The model has been emulated in Sustainable Warwick’s “Coolest Recycling Drive,” first held in the spring of 2023 and collecting 130 appliances. Scaling the model up would involve spending about $6.50/metric ton of CO2 equivalent.  In the spring of 2024, New Yorkers for Cool Refrigerant Management and Sustainable Hudson Valley held a demonstration collection drive in Ulster County and Warwick, collecting over 500 appliances; the partners will advocate for these collection services to be grown as programs with allied enterprises, as envisioned by proposed EPR legislation before the New York State legislature (S6105B/A10624). 

For New York to meet its 2030 goal it needs to reduce emissions by 92,000,000 metric tons annually; if that were done solely by capturing refrigerants, it would only cost ~$600 million/year – shockingly less than many climate budgets under discussion.  This suggests refrigerant management is a highly cost-effective climate solution that deserves high priority.

Construction Material 

Construction materials such as concrete, steel, and foam plastic insulation are materials of concern because of the amount of energy required to create them, also known as embodied energy. Reducing the energy needed to create construction material will reduce the related GHG emissions. Production of Portland cement, in particular, is a very energy intensive process. An emerging area of opportunity is research at MIT and elsewhere, which has identified far less carbon-intensive alternatives and methods of making concrete that can actually use carbon dioxide as an ingredient, sequestering significant amounts. The Low Embodied Carbon Concrete Act was passed by the NYS Legislature in June, 2021 with a requirement for the state to develop a program for specifying this product for state-funded construction projects.  A specific product, the Rivertown Low Carbon Concrete Sidewalk Mix, was developed by members of the consortium OpenAir in partnership with the Village of Hastings on Hudson, utilizing locally available ground glass pozzolan as a substitute for Portland cement. This mix was piloted by the City of New York and extensively tested. It can now be implemented by any municipality or developer at competitive cost. 

Other ways to lower the embodied energy in building materials is to use materials such as mass timber, cross laminated timber, hemp lime and wood fiber insulation.  Building materials with high recycled content are also preferable.  Today, buildings can be designed to sequester more greenhouse gases than they produce – an opportunity worth pursuing through local policies and outreach to the construction industries. 

On the social side of the building and construction industries, also, there is growing recognition of human rights issues. Globally, 25 million people are subject to forced labor, and child labor involves 152 million children. The Design For Freedom has convened a Working Group of 60 prominent leaders in architecture, engineering, construction and the international building materials supply chain, intimately connected to the construction industry and the sourcing of building materials.  They have created a framework for challenging forced labor in these industries, setting achievable goals and creating tools including standards, auditing practices, big data, and business models.  This is not typically considered as part of the building materials supply chain, but to the extent that Hudson Valley contractors purchase their materials at conventional big box suppliers, the issue should be considered and as much data brought to light as possible.   

One source of regional focus and momentum would be a project to create  model local building codes to maximize incentives for use of sustainable building materials, and especially low embodied carbon building and structural materials.  The potential for  developing a Hudson Valley based green building and structural materials industry cluster should be assessed through work with economic development agencies toward the goal by 2040 of supplying a majority of building and structural materials for the region, from within the region,  through materials research, product design and reuse strategies.  For example, timber is a low embodied carbon building material that is already produced in the region’s forests, and healthy forests are an essential foundation for carbon sequestration. 

The lowest-carbon building materials are those that are reclaimed and reused from existing materials streams, including both surplus and reclaimed materials through deconstruction of existing buildings, rather than demolition. Deconstruction is often more labor-intensive than conventional demolition, but uses less energy and provides the revenue stream of reclaimed materials, contributing to its economic viability.  Over the years, committed craftspeople have developed cost-effective deconstruction methods, such as dismantling buildings but leaving walls intact for reuse as “post-fab” panels for creating sheds and other structures.  In some communities such as Portland, Oregon, local ordinances require deconstruction of historic buildings and those built during periods when asbestos and other hazardous materials were in wide use.  A gentle incentive to develop a deconstruction industry would be for local and county governments to require deconstruction - or even feasibility studies for it - for public buildings.   

Ulster County has developed a strategic plan for a Reuse Innovation Center, with funding from the Legislature. Its initial anchoring industry would be construction and demolition materials, chosen as the heaviest, bulkiest and most energy-intensive items now being landfilled, and for their often-high resale value.  This might serve as a hub for a regional network of enterprises to collect and reuse high-value materials, connecting existing municipal services with the wider network of circular economy entrepreneurs that has come to life in the Hudson Valley. A large, “home depot style” used building materials outlet, with showroom, is proposed as the anchor with a deconstruction business and training program, upcycled craft enterprises, repair and training among the core operations.  If this model an be demonstrated in Ulster county, it might serve as a replicable model for additional centers in other parts of the Hudson Valley.  

Case Study: Reuse Innovation Center

Ulster County has developed a strategic plan for a Reuse Innovation Center, and has tasked the Ulster County Resource Recovery Agency with implementing the plan.

The Reuse Innovation Center’s function is to build  the circular economy by encouraging the creative reuse of materials at a significant scale. Designed to include over 100,000 square feet of retail space to sell salvaged and surplus building materials, textiles, and much more, the RIC will provide a collaborative space for small businesses, a showroom, training center, specialized recycling facilities and more. Its initial anchoring industry would be construction and demolition materials, chosen as the heaviest, bulkiest and most energy-intensive items now being landfilled, and for their often-high resale value.  This might serve as a hub for a regional network of enterprises to collect and reuse high-value materials, connecting existing municipal services with the wider network of circular economy entrepreneurs that has come to life in the Hudson Valley. A large, “home depot style” used building materials outlet, with showroom, is proposed as the anchor with a deconstruction business and training program, upcycled craft enterprises, repair and training among the core operations.  If this model can be demonstrated in Ulster county, it might serve as a replicable model for additional centers in other parts of the Hudson Valley.