The time is now for an equitable and just economic transition in New York State.

HR&A Advisors and its statewide team of planning and technical experts are proud to be a part of the New York State Energy Regulatory Authority (NYSERDA) Just Transition Site Reuse Planning Program. The program delivers planning assistance to communities seeking to transform fossil fueled powerplant sites into community assets that generate economic prosperity—as part of an equitable and just transition to a clean energy economy.
 
Legacy powerplants now represent a key frontier for realizing a just transition in New York State. Their redevelopment has the potential to address long-standing economic inequities and environmental injustices while also creating sources of stable and good-paying jobs, local business development, durable wealth generation, and inclusive community amenities.

Expertise

The HR&A team brings the confluence of technical analysis and planning expertise, a pragmatic focus on feasibility, and a commitment to equity and inclusion that is necessary to accomplish a just transition. Never content with your plan “sitting on the shelf,” our unique breadth and expertise enables us to serve as trusted partners to municipalities and local governments and set up site reuse projects ready for implementation.
 

  • Our comprehensive suite of services can address a variety of unique, local planning challenges, ranging from identifying funding to realize a bold project, to mitigating local vulnerabilities to flooding, to setting design standards for a seamless and inviting transition between the site and the surrounding community.
  • Our deep expertise in real estate dynamics will ensure your project and implementation strategy reflects fundamental economic and market feasibility.
  • Our commitment to meaningful community engagement will help build consensus and set the conditions for a plan that harnesses the momentum of community buy-in.
  • Our specialized expertise in public health, inclusive job creation, and green business development puts muscle behind our commitment to site reuse plans that prioritize durable equitable outcomes for all members of a community.

Services

Distill principles, aspirations, and desired outcomes for powerplant site reuse into a compelling vision that guides the project.

Identify and convene a representative range of community stakeholders, and create compelling and site reuse presentations that drive public decision-making.

Diagnose the region’s high-level real estate market competitiveness, local economic conditions, and demographic conditions. Financial gap analysis can measure the public subsidy required to realize a project that is not feasible on its own.

Study ways to preserve or enhance the character and historical quality of existing structures, landscape features and topography, and accessibility conditions onsite.

Estimate the economic benefits of site reuse, such as green job creation, job quality, and the accessibility of jobs on the basis of gender, race, and other identities.

Strategize ways to advance opportunities in the cleantech industry for local entrepreneurs and workers, including those transitioning from careers in fossil fuel industries.

Catalog potential non-municipal funding sources (county, state, federal) as well as applicable financing and governance strategies that could support project delivery.

Observe basic site conditions such as air, water, and soil quality; pollution levels; hazardous materials; ecology; etc., and the need for further environmental investigation or remediation/restoration.

Determine public health impacts of the existing site and facilities in coordination with the municipality and community, through stakeholder conversations, analysis of air quality improvements and emissions reductions, etc.

Outline how a changing future climate and risks from sea level rise, floods, extreme heat, and other impacts might reshape or challenge uses at the site and within the surrounding area.

Team

HR&A’s team is a diverse, high-capacity team of experts spanning downstate and upstate New York that is designed to fulfill communities’ wide-ranging needs and goals for a just transition:

HR&A Advisors

HR&A Advisors brings over 40 years of experience in economic development, real estate, and public policy. We have led transformative market analyses, real estate development feasibility analyses, disposition strategies, and community engagement programs around large-scale power plant, brownfield, industrial, and major redevelopment sites—approaching this work at the intersection of pragmatic economic feasibility analysis and a passionate commitment to realizing equitable, inclusive outcomes through economic revitalization.

WXY Studio

WXY Studio is a WBE-certified multi-disciplinary practice based in New Your City consisting of architects, urban designers, planners, policymakers, and strategists. They have led land use, urban design, and architectural design projects in brownfields and post-industrial sites throughout New York City and State.

Fisher Associates

Fisher Associates is a multidisciplinary planning, engineering, and environmental services firm bringing 37 years of experience helping communities across New York State revitalize brownfield sites with a focus on renewable energy strategy. With offices located in Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse, Fisher Associates has provided professional services to 60 out of 62 counties in NYS.

One Architecture & Urbanism

One Architecture & Urbanism (ONE) is an award-winning design and planning firm that has completed major climate resilience projects in New York State and around the world, ranging in scale from site-specific interventions to urban and regional resilience plans. They deliver community-led adaptation plans integrating infrastructure, nature-based solutions, and climate-proof ecologies.

Matrix New World Engineering

Matrix New World Engineering is a WBE-certified environmental and engineering firm with extensive experience in environmental remediation, brownfield redevelopment, natural resource management, and site surveying.

PSE Healthy Energy

PSE Healthy Energy is a nonprofit energy science and policy research institute dedicated to the analysis of the myriad health and environmental impacts of legacy fossil fuel powerplants and the potential of redeveloping those sites into alternative, environmentally sustainable uses.

Urban Future Lab

Urban Future Lab—part of New York University’s Tandon School of Engineering—manages a business incubation and workforce development hub for the cleantech industry in New York. UFL incubates innovative cleantech startups and also developed and manages a training program for workers who seek to transition their careers to the cleantech sector.