Builders Group completes green dynamometer installation for DSNY

Builders Group has completed the installation of a heavy-duty-vehicle emissions testing laboratory - including a 25-ton chassis dynamometer with seven-foot single-axle rollers and exhaust gas analyzers - in a special 40,000 s/f facility at the New York City Department of Sanitation (DSNY) garage and maintenance complex in the Woodside section of Queens. The facility is the first of its kind erected in the Northeast and the only one in the nation operated by a municipal agency. The other installations, which may number as few as three or four, are at research and education facilities around the country. Builders Group served as design build/construction manager for the project under a joint venture with architect Alta Indelman, who designed the facility. Harley Ellis served as consulting engineers. The dynamometer itself was developed by Horiba Corp., based in Kyoto, Japan. "This has been a complex project that presented many challenges, but the end result provides the city and the Department of Sanitation with an important advantage in energy efficiency while making the air we breathe as clean as possible," said George Figliolia, president of Builders Group. "We're proud to have been a part of this important green initiative." Rocco DiRico, DSNY deputy commissioner for support services, whose staff will manage the facility, says the laboratory and dynamometer will play a vital role in decision-making as the department gradually converts its fleet of some 6,000 trucks and other vehicles to use new transportation technologies.