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Maintaining park spaces that are vibrant, sustainable and accessible is always an energy-intensive effort. Dedicated people provide a heroic share of the power supply, but still there are needs to be met — lighting, building heat, grounds maintenance and transportation spring to mind. The push toward net-zero emissions, together with the imperatives of efficiency and cost effectiveness, make energy one of the defining challenges for park advocates and professionals.
In this environment, one cleaner fuel that is already in wide use — propane — has emerged as a viable solution for organizations working to meet their evolving energy needs as they push to reduce carbon emissions.
Most people’s awareness of propane begins and ends with a backyard barbecue grill. Few realize that each of the energy needs listed above is currently being met safely and reliably by propane applications — and users are reducing costs and emissions along the way.
The Cleaner Fuel Option
Propane is a fixture wherever portable energy is needed. Camp grills and generators often are fueled by propane. Acadia National Park in Maine even uses propane autogas to run its Island Explorer buses. The Island Explorer takes millions of passengers to the attractions within the park and the surrounding community each year — all within a very fragile and delicate ecosystem. When officials began the transit system in 1999, they believed it was important to operate with clean fuel, and propane autogas was the clear choice.
According to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Alternative Fuels Data Center, “using propane as a vehicle fuel can provide the convenience of on-site fueling economically, improves public health and the environment, provides safety benefits, and contributes to a resilient transportation system.”
Propane’s carbon intensity is also among the lowest of any common energy source. Carbon intensity is a measure of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases (CO2e) per unit of energy produced. Propane has a carbon intensity of 79 (measured in grams of CO2 equivalent per Megajoule, or gCO2e/MJ). By comparison, the average U.S. grid carbon intensity is 130.
Another attractive feature of propane is that it is nontoxic. An outdoor leak will not contaminate soil or water; it will dissipate into the air with very little global warming potential. While it is a carbon-based energy, propane’s unique attributes make it cleaner than many alternatives.
Propane’s Benefits on Display
Miami-Dade County, Florida, is one of the most populous U.S. counties. Its department of parks, recreation and open spaces (PROS) faces a balancing act in providing services to the city’s residents and visitors, as well as in caring for park facilities.
One of the department’s challenges was finding a more efficient way for its crews to maintain the many green spaces in the county’s special tax districts — 42 parks, 122 residential communities and more than 200 acres of sports fields. The PROS department also holds contracts to do maintenance for other departments within the county, including the Port of Miami and the Miami Police Department. After researching options, the department found that using commercial propane mowers instead of gasoline could increase crew productivity, as well as reduce fuel costs and emissions.
Maintenance costs are also greatly reduced for the county’s propane mower fleet. In-house mechanics were trained to work on the propane mowers by the mower manufacturer and quickly experienced maintenance advantages that helped reduce costs and increase uptime. Clean, ethanol-free propane keeps mower engines free from contamination and prevents filters from clogging.
Potentially best of all, a propane mower fleet offers the department reduced costs and increased productivity — not to mention a clean emissions profile. This, in turn, helps the department remain fiscally responsible.
Acadia’s propane buses help illustrate the larger point — replacing gasoline and diesel, and therefore, reducing carbon and other emissions, can be done more economically, in many cases, by switching to propane than by going fully electric.
One interesting analysis of the EPA’s Clean School Bus program was published by the Propane Education and Research Council (PERC). The program provides funding for school districts to replace aging diesel and gasoline-powered buses with cleaner alternatives, including electric and propane buses. In 2023, nearly $1 billion in funding went almost entirely toward the purchase of 2,675 electric school buses. PERC calculated that for the same amount of money, school districts could purchase 32,104 propane buses to replace diesel models, and those buses would reduce nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions by 8,535 metric tons per year (compared to 755 metric tons per year for the electric buses) and CO2 emissions by 169,957 metric tons per year (compared to 41,684 metric tons per year for electric) over their diesel counterparts.
It’s easy to see how cost and emissions reductions vs. diesel could translate to other transportation and non-transportation functions as well.
Possibilities With Propane
Park and recreation departments currently using gasoline- or diesel-powered applications should take a hard look at propane. In recent years, propane-fueled power generation products have progressed by leaps and bounds in terms of variety and performance.
Elements that can enhance people’s enjoyment of parks and recreational spaces, such as outdoor heaters and fireplaces, are also prime platforms for propane. Anyone who has attended an all-day soccer or softball event in early spring where temperatures struggle to top 40 degrees can appreciate the idea of a propane heating tower.
Propane is also used alone and in conjunction with renewable energy sources to support electrification. Electric vehicle (EV) chargers give EV drivers a charging option in remote places where electric infrastructure is scarce. These can be found in places like west Texas, South Dakota, Appalachia and even extreme northern British Columbia, Canada.
Propane-assisted wind and solar microgrids are providing electricity to residential developments and commercial facilities alike. Propane provides reliability to these micro-grids when conditions don’t favor the wind and solar components.
In some of the largest states, utilities are finding it safer and more economical to install microgrids with solar and propane-fueled backup systems in remote areas rather than upgrading transmission lines to mitigate wildfire concerns.
Propane for the Future
The ways the park and recreation agencies highlighted in this article are using propane to power their work, in addition to the other myrid possibilities outlined, exemplify how propane can help to power parks and recreation in a clean, safe, reliable and cost-effective way.
Gordon Feller is Global Fellow: WWIC at The Smithsonian Institution.