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A CSX Transportation assistant chief engineer has achieved the rail industry's top environmentalist honor — the sixth CSXT employee to attain the recognition. Yesterday, the Association of American Railroads (AAR) name Michael O'Malley the winner of the John H. Chafee Environmental Excellence Award.

The award is named after former U.S. Sen. Lincoln Chafee's late father, a former senator from Rhode Island who promoted the environmental advantages of rail transportation. The AAR presents the award annually to recognize a railroad employee who has demonstrated outstanding environmental awareness and responsibility.

CSXT’s assistant chief engineer-facilities in Jacksonville, Fla., O'Malley manages two ongoing LEED certification projects that are expected to set the Class I’s building standards for years to come. He has also led efforts to install and use solar power whenever feasible, which have produced net energy cost savings of $9.3 million over the past five years and significantly reduced air emissions. O’Malley has introduced facility consolidations that limit the number of buildings needed to operate while also improving operational efficiency, incorporated solar-powered water heaters and marine navigational lighting, and improved recycling practices to recover materials that previously were sent to a landfill.

The four other railroaders nominated for the award were BNSF Railway Co. electrician Dean Forshee; Amtrak mechanical department foreman E. Thomas Meyer; Union Pacific Railroad wastewater treatment plant operator Patrick O'Leary; and Norfolk Southern Railway Engineer-Geotechnical Services John Tomlin.

The AAR also presented the Congressional Chafee Award to Sen. Thomas Carper (D-Del.). The award recognizes a congressional member who demonstrates dedication to the environment.

“He was the principal sponsor of legislation to control power plant emissions of nitrogen oxide, sulfur oxide, mercury and carbon dioxide,” said AAR President and Chief Executive Officer Ed Hamberger in a prepared statement. “Senator Carper was also a leading sponsor of the Diesel Emissions Reduction Act, which has been used to finance the retrofit and replacement of diesel engines in metropolitan areas across the country.”

Carper also is a sponsor of the recently introduced Clean, Low-Emission, Affordable, New Transportation Efficiency Act (S. 575), which would make new freight-rail capacity eligible for some of the billions of dollars in new climate revenue the bill would raise, Hamberger said.