MassDEP Awards Over $5,100 in Grants to Three Communities
 to Help Clean Up Emissions from Municipal Off-Road Engines  

The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) announced today that, for the first time, three towns in the state have received a total of $5,135 in pollution control equipment on their municipal off-road engines. The pollution control equipment is designed to reduce fine particulate matter (PM), a pollutant that has been implicated in the state's rising asthma rates and is considered a probable carcinogen.

Cummins Northeast, Inc., a national vendor of retrofit equipment, will install a diesel oxidation catalyst (DOC) on three front-end loaders owned by the towns of Bernardston, North Andover, and Wakefield. DOCs, which function like a catalytic converter, can reduce fine PM (PM that is 2.5 or less micrometers in diameter) by 25 percent, hydrocarbons by 60 percent, and carbon monoxide by 60 percent.

"Pollution from particulate matter can have serious health consequences for our citizens, so MassDEP has made it a top priority to reduce this pollution from buses, trucks and off-road vehicles," said MassDEP Commissioner Laurie Burt. "These grants will assist our municipal partners in their efforts to clean the air in their communities." 

MassDEP awarded the grants with funding from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as part of the Northeast Diesel Collaborative Emissions Reduction-Voluntary Diesel Retrofit Program. MassDEP administers the EPA grant through the Municipal Sustainability Grant Program.

The retrofit program is part of MassDEP's strategy to reduce fine PM in Massachusetts - a strategy that includes a $22 million grant to retrofit all Massachusetts school and transit buses, enforcement of the state's anti-idling regulation, contract requirements to retrofit off-road engines used in state-funded construction projects, and regulations requiring strict emission standards for a range of diesel vehicles.

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