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Colleges Working to Reduce Energy Consumption
Going Green
Going Green: Colleges Working to Reduce Energy Consumption
More and more colleges and universities are working to reduce their energy consumption and lower their carbon footprint. Many are being spurred on by their students, like at St. Lawrence University in Northern New York.
“Last year, the student body said they were concerned about the impact of electricity usage on campus. Through the student government association they found the money to purchase the energy credits equivalent to 50 percent of the Student Center's consumption," said Ron Dixon, SLU Development and Sustainability Coordinator.
So this year, the University administration stepped in and purchased enough credits to cover 100 percent of the Student Center's electric use and they now buy windpower to provide 50 percent of the electricity for a new building.
“The building that we're in right now, our new Johnson Hall of Science, is a LEED Gold certified building. In order to achieve that LEED Gold status, we need to power 50 percent of this building from renewable sources,” Dixon said.
St. Lawrence University is buying over 3,000 megawatt hours of renewable energy generated by windmill farms to supply 15 percent of all campus electric needs. But you pay a premium for windmill power so the first priority is cut back on how much electricity is used.
“There's a whole number of projects and programs to try to cut down on our consumption first and foremost be it doing energy audits, making our buildings more efficient, putting in motion sensors and what have you and behavior change programs," said Dixon.
Our primary mission here is to educate and put out the leaders of society of tomorrow so in taking this kind of approach we can educate our students on this and they can take it out on their next step in life.
