HEARD AROUND TOWN

HEARD AROUND TOWN:

* Before Kathryn Garcia was appointed New York City sanitation commissioner this weekend, she served as chief operating officer at the city’s Department of Environmental Protection—a role she held when she participated in a City & State energy conference last fall. At the event, she touted a variety of innovative conservation and efficiency initiatives at DEP (at the 20:53 mark), including some that directly tie to her new role at the Department of Sanitation. “We are hoping that the Public Service Commission approves our sale of digestor gas to National Grid,” she said. “We are taking food waste to see if we can produce more digestor gas, which is basically methane.” She also mentioned open landfill spaces that could be used for solar power (48:50). “That continues to be a focus of the organization: How can we look at the landfills that have been recently capped and think of them as a resource rather than as a drain?”