TESTIMONY
Testimony: Sabrina Littmann, Senior VP for Portfolio Management, EDC on Shore Power Expansion
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15 min
Sabrina Littmann, Senior Vice President for Portfolio Management at the NYC Economic Development Corporation (EDC), testifies on the expansion of shore power at NYC cruise terminals. Littmann outlines the EDC's commitment to sustainability, economic impact, and shore power's role in reducing emissions. She emphasizes the need for collaboration with the cruise industry to enhance shore power capabilities and introduces long-term agreements to ensure economic benefits for local communities and adherence to environmental goals.
Speaker 7
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Chair of Fabias and members of the Economic Development Committee.
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My name is Sabrina Littmann, and I serve as the Senior Vice President for Portfolio Management at the New York City Economic Development Corporation.
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I am joined today by my colleagues, Andrew Genn, Senior Vice President of Transportation, McKell Adgate, Senior Vice President of Government And Community Relations and Felix Cevaggio's Vice President in our Portfolio Management department.
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As you know, EDC is charged with creating a vibrant, inclusive, and globally competitive economy for all New Yorkers.
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Which includes but is not limited to promoting economic development and stewardship for the city's waterfront.
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To achieve our mission, we take a comprehensive approach through 4 main strategies.
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We strengthen confidence in New York City as a great place to do business, We grow innovation industries focusing on equity.
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We build neighborhoods as places to live, learn, work, and play.
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And we deliver sustainable infrastructure for communities and the city's future economy.
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As part of this mandate, EDC manages 6 4,000,000 square feet of real estate across approximately 220 assets.
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We have a very broad portfolio of waterfront assets across all fibros.
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Which includes the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal, the New York City Ferry Landings, the Brooklyn Army Terminal, South Street Seaport, Hunts Point wholesale markets, and Saint George And Tomskinville, Esplanade, as well as the Manhattan and Brooklyn cruise terminals.
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Annually, the cruise industry serves 30,000,000 passengers globally with an average of 1,100,000 passengers coming through our city with the local economic impact of over $400,000,000 annually.
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In New York City, the industry directly employs 2000 full time jobs across the hospitality, tourism, and transportation sectors.
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And an additional 500 jobs throughout other city industries.
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Each ship call supports a 115 local union jobs and a 100 seasonal jobs.
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We have forecasted that in 2023, more than 1,300,000 passengers came to New York City and brought an estimated $420,000,000 in local economic impact from spending by passengers and crew members.
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EDC is committed to sustainability, the development of the green economy, and climate resiliency for the city.
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The green economy is the city and EDC's vision for an economic future that puts human well-being at the forefront.
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By decarbonizing our economy to address the existential risk of climate change, diversifying our economic base, and driving job creation in clean energy industries to create new opportunities for New Yorkers, while supporting the communities in our city that have historically been the most vulnerable to climate and environmental risk.
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This vision serves as the foundation for our current shore power work and I want to be crystal clear that we absolutely share the council's goals of introduction 4.
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And are committed to increasing the availability and utilization of shore power at both the Brooklyn And Manhattan Cruise Terminals.
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And improving traffic management within those local neighborhoods.
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The cruise industry is committed to transitioning to shore power.
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As one of its strategies to reduce emissions and address climate change.
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Shorepower is the process of providing electrical power from the ship, to the shore while it's stocked.
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It allows a ship's auxiliary engines to be turned off and decisions regarding the safety and feasibility of using shore power where available is a decision that must be made by the ship's captain in consultation with electrical consultants.
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Currently, 40% of all cruise ships around the world are shore power capable.
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By 2028, the Cruise Line International Association, known as Klea, reports that 71% of its member vessels will be short power capable.
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Additionally, the industry has established a goal date of 2035 for all exist ships to be retrofitted with shore power capability.
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It is worth noting, as mentioned, that BCT Brooklyn Cruise Terminal remains the only shore power equipped cruise terminal on the East Coast.
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Similarly, even ports considered leaders in shore power such as Seattle are still working toward greater shore power capability with an aim to equip all home port cruise ships with shore power capability by 2030.
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Shore Power is also a large financial savings for ships.
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They will connect whenever possible.
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The decision to connect to shore power is never arbitrary.
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When cruise lines are unable to utilize shore power, It is because the power grid cannot handle the ship's needs without overloading the system.
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And or there are safety concerns with connecting because of weather or load shedding.
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EDC's management of the Manhattan and Brooklyn crews terminals on behalf of the city is accomplished through a number of ownership and operating agreements at each location.
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The Manhattan Cruise Terminal is owned by the New York City Department of Small Business Services.
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EDC serves as the lease administrator.
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The Brooklyn cruise terminal is owned by the Port Authority of New York And New Jersey.
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And EDC serves as the Leasee on-site.
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The private company, Ports America, serves as the operator of both cruise terminals through an operating agreement with EDC at in Brooklyn and through a lease agreement with the city in Manhattan.
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As the cruise terminal operator, ports America provides service at the terminals to ships and their passengers.
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They receive requests from the cruise lines for births and manage the docking calendar.
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The Brooklyn cruise terminal in Redhook opened in 2006 and can accommodate one ship at a time.
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The existing Shore Power System at this site became operational in 2017.
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After a $19,000,000 investment from the port authority, the environmental protection agency, and New York State.
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This was the 1st shore power system for cruise ships installed on the East Coast of the United States and remains the only shore power capable terminal on the East Coast.
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It is among only 3% of ports worldwide that are connected or equipped with shore power.
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The system first installed was specifically designed for the Cunard and Princess ships that were primarily serving BCT at the time.
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Princess and Cunard ships always attempt to connect to shore power when they are docked at BCT.
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And in 2023, they connected successfully over 70% of the time.
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Generally, when ships do not connect or disengage, it is because of load shedding or when the power or the shore power supply is not sufficient to power the vessel.
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It would also have a negative impact on the neighborhood's power grid.
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Weather dependent as well.
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To expand the shore power systems ability to connect with additional ships, EDC began conceptualizing a plan in late 2019 to fund and install a mobile cable positioning device on the pure apron.
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This project and many other capital projects were paused at the onset of the pandemic.
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We have aligned our budget and capital planning to prioritize this work.
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Because we understand and know how critical and urgent it is to improve the connection rates in Brooklyn and ensure that more cruise ships are able to access shore power.
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We are working with our vendor and our contractors and expect this work to be fully completed by the end of this calendar year 2024.
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The Manhattan Cruise Terminal located appears 8890 can accommodate up to 3 ships at a time, and the vast majority of New York City's cruise passengers utilize this terminal.
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Due to the size and the complexity of this terminal, the adoption of a shore power connection will be a lengthy process.
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But it is one that EDC is steadfast and committed to pursuing.
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EDC initiated and is currently completing a feasibility study that will identify the next steps with respect to shore power at Manhattan Cruise Terminal.
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The final step of this study is receiving an energy load assessment from Conatus Following the receipt of this assessment, EDC will review options, funding opportunities, and develop an RFP for this project.
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While we want to be transparent about the uncertain time frame and potential infrastructure challenges of bringing shore power to MCT, we remain committed to exploring and pursuing every avenue to do so.
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As part of our long term strategy to ensure that the cruise industry fulfills economic and sustainability goals for the city in fall of last year, EDC received board approval to enter into long term agreements with 3 cruise companies.
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The Mediterranean Shipping Company known as MSC, Carnival, and Norwegian Cruise Lines.
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The long term agreements will govern approximately 80% to 85% of ships utilizing our terminals today, bringing stability to the industry, and benefits to the city and neighborhoods that host these terminals.
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We know that we must do more to ensure that local businesses and communities experience the economic benefits.
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Of New York City's cruise and tourism economy.
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And that is why we pushed our long term agreement partners to include unique advantages that have never been contemplated or achieved in previous agreements.
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We have leveraged our long term agreements to ensure that New York City's cruise industry is bringing economic benefit to the communities, committing to shore power, contributing to workforce opportunities, and learning in exchange for preferential birthing at our terminals.
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With the implementation of our long term agreements, we have negotiated terms requiring that the cruise lines establish educational partnerships to provide networking and job opportunities for New Yorkers as well as a local provisioning plan to create contracting opportunities for city businesses while also maximizing contracting opportunities for MWBs.
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Cruise lines that enter into long term agreements with EDC must also contribute to a first of its kind community priority fund through a per passenger fee, and we will be working closely with council members, Avelis, and botcher to ensure that these monies will be used to address the needs and projects identified by the local community.
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These benefits did not exist in earlier agreements.
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These agreements also function as an additional mesh to ensure that cruise companies commit to shore power development and availability across their vessels and operations in New York City.
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To this end, any long term agreement requires that a cruise line first uses shore power for New York City based ships when not available and operationally feasible.
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2nd, commits to reduce emissions while in port were operationally feasible, and lastly, commits that all new ships calling into New York City after 2028 will have shore power connections.
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And that all older vessels will be retrofitted with shore power capability ahead of the 2035 Cruise Line International Association goal date.
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For the 15% to 20% of ships utilizing our terminals without a long term agreement with EDC, These ships also have an interest in connecting to shore power when feasible and available, as it is significantly less expensive fuel source.
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And all cruise lines are committed to decarbonization initiatives.
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We understand that cruise ships generate traffic impacts in the surrounding communities.
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As passengers embark and disembark, and we are dedicated to minimizing these effects on local communities.
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We recognize that Redhook has experienced significant traffic challenges last year when MSC began temporarily birthing in the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal.
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I want to sincerely thank council member of Elis and her team for working with us and the community to identify and improve traffic flow through way finding improvements, improved circulation patterns, augmented ferry service, renewed signage and deployment of additional traffic agents.
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These mitigation strategies are closely coordinated with our partners and colleagues at the Department of Transportation, the New York City Police Department, and the Port Authority of New York And New Jersey.
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I also want to restate our commitment to continuous traffic planning and coordination with our partners along with our goal of reducing personal vehicles and 4 higher vehicles in and out of both terminals, and supporting more public transit uses.
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As a part of this commitment, any cruise line that is a party to a long term agreement is required to share passenger data with EDC for transportation planning purposes.
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Turning to introduction 4.
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We want to thank the council.
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For your leadership on the important issues of sustainability and traffic planning, EDC is fully aligned on the goals of improving Shore Power Connectivity, Everglen Cruise Terminal, implementing Shore Power at the Manhattan Cruise Terminal, and improving traffic planning in both communities.
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This commitment is reflected by our long term agreements and our ongoing work to address climate change, develop renewable energy and create sustainable infrastructure across the city.
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We look forward to this addressing these issues further to ensure that we are addressing the impacts to the communities on the ground.
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Thank you so much.
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For the opportunity to speak with you today, and we are happy to answer any questions you may have.
Speaker 1
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Thank you so much for your testimony, I'm going to yield my time temporarily to allow my colleagues to ask their questions first.
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I'd like to call on council member, ambulance.
Speaker 2
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Thank you so much, chair.