QUESTION
Council Member Erik Bottcher Asks EDC About Electrification Timeline at Manhattan Cruise Terminal
1:04:35
·
3 min
Council Member Erik Bottcher questions the Economic Development Corporation (EDC) on the electrification timeline for the Manhattan cruise ship terminal. The EDC outlines the complexity of implementing shore power, including infrastructure upgrades and the critical role of a pending Con Edison load letter. The feasibility study is near completion, and the next steps depend on the grid capacity confirmation. The EDC commits to keeping stakeholders informed and engaged throughout the process.
Speaker 3
1:04:35
Thank you so much.
1:04:38
I'd like to drill down on the timeline for electrification of the Manhattan cruise ship terminal.
1:04:45
Thank you for being transparent in your testimony.
1:04:50
I think the way you put it was, we want to be untransparent about the uncertain time frame.
1:04:56
So we understand that.
1:04:58
You can't right now give us dates and and benchmarks.
1:05:07
Attached to date.
1:05:08
But I really wanna try to understand under the best case scenario how soon our constituents can expect to see shore power on at the Manhattan cruise ship terminal.
1:05:23
Here you say that the EDC initiated and is currently completing a feasibility study that will identify next steps with respect to shore power.
1:05:35
When can we expect to see that feasibility study completed?
Speaker 7
1:05:43
Thank you.
1:05:44
Council member Botcher, and happy to answer that.
1:05:48
I wanna start by saying it's important to note that SurePower is tremendously complicated.
1:05:54
It requires again, there there is no universal standard, but it also requires significant infrastructure upgrades, whether it new substations, switchboards, sawtooth and cabling positioning devices, and other complicated electrical work.
1:06:08
With that said, the feasibility study that we've commissioned for Manhattan Cruise Terminal is near completion.
1:06:16
We quite literally have just one remaining item left, and that is that Con Edison load letter, which is incredibly critical because that will inform us as to whether there is available grid capacity for the additional 13 megawatts that is needed for the system.
1:06:37
We are expecting that letter from Con Edison quite literally any day now, and that Once we have that, if the grid capacity is confirmed, which we we won't know until we have it, and it it would mean that Con Edison is willing to allow 13 megawatts added to their grid, we can start and begin capital planning.
1:07:01
What that looks like right now per peer is looking between $15 to $20,000,000 of an investment.
1:07:09
To start standing up a shore power system.
1:07:13
If it doesn't have the 13 megawatts, then what the means is that we would need to incorporate utility upgrade cost.
1:07:20
And that utility upgrade cost is gonna be dependent on what that load letter tells us and how much more we would need to build or if we need to build a substation.
1:07:29
With that said, we already are starting with things that we can start with.
1:07:34
So for example, we have a trench project because we will be trenching and those that power through cables, and we're trying to start all of that infrastructure work now ahead of it.
1:07:45
But until that load letter is really in hand, depending on what it says.
1:07:49
There are 2 very disparate tracks, which is causing the frustration that we have that we can't provide a time frame at this time.
1:07:57
What I can commit to and and what I know we are committed to is that we will keep your office and the community fully engaged as we have in Redhook as these items come to pass so that you're fully it is a fully transparent open line of communication and you understand where we are in the process.
Speaker 3
1:08:17
Thank you.