"TRB's National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) Report 751: Renewable Energy Guide for Highway Maintenance Facilities offers guidance for the application of renewable energy technologies to the heating and cooling, lighting, and electrical power requirements of highway maintenance facilities."--Publisher's description.

A highway engineer considering an alternative energy source for an upcoming project probably does not have a background in heating, ventilation and air-conditioning or electrical engineering, but with overall responsibility for the project needs to determine quickly whether or not an alternative energy source is cost-effective. If it is cost-effective, he would then need to know the design process and terminology to supervise the designer's work. The guide meets these needs, and in addition, offers a selected bibliography of published informaiton, a listing of persons with experience in this area, and a selection of actual case studies of highway agencies that have used alternative energy sources successfully.

This synthesis report will be of interest to state, local, and federal agency environmental and maintenance administrators, directors, supervisors, engineers, and scientists. It describes current best management practices (BMPs) for environmental issues related to road and street maintenance. The synthesis documents relevant background and recent information with regard to management practices that can help protect, preserve, or enhance the environment while at the same time allow road maintenance organizations to carry out their fundamental mission of maintenance and repair in a cost-effective manner. Information for the synthesis was collected by surveying U.S. and Canadian state and local transportation agencies and by conducting a literature search using domestic sources. This report of the Transportation Research Board describes BMPs consisting of broad management approaches applicable to the entire maintenance program or to more than one program area. In addition, BMPs for specific maintenance activities or groups of maintenance activities are included. Finally, BMPs concerning specific environmental issues are discussed.

This publication provides a guide to the Minnesota Department of Transportation's current research activities.