Close-up of logo for Caltrain commuter rail system atop a two level train car in the Silicon Valley, Mountain View, California, May 3, 2019. (Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)
SamTrans has released its latest sustainability report, highlighting its environmental progress during the last two years as the transit agency combats climate change.
SamTrans officials said the agency has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 9 percent and its electricity usage by 23 percent. The agency has also reduced its generation of air pollutants, or CAPs, by 18 percent.
The report added that 40 percent of California's greenhouse gas emissions are created by surface transportation.
While SamTrans officials said Caltrain ridership has yet to fully recover from COVID-19 and the resulting shelter-in-place order, ridership prior to the pandemic beginning in March 2020 had grown steadily over the last decade, displacing thousands of cars that would otherwise be commuting, for example, on U.S. Highway 101. Even despite lower ridership in the last two years, Caltrain reduced the agency's net GHG emissions by 11 percent, air pollution generation by 10 percent, and facility energy use is down 6 percent.
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