Five USM students recently attended a conference at Harvard not knowing where they would sleep. The four girls and guy found an offer of floor space in a dorm room though, and everyone left with a smile.
The conference was organized by Harvard’s Environmental Action Committee and The Climate Campaign, a coalition of Northeast schools from nine states working to reduce human activities that contribute to global climate change.
The Climate Campaign works with eight Northeast member state groups to establish a strong regional voice for climate change action. Student support of each of the eight state networks makes the program effective.
The Maine branch of the network, the Maine Climate Campaign, has already begun working with the Green Campus Consortium of Maine (USM is a founding member of this organization!), and The Natural Resources Council of Maine.
The group’s objectives are to encourage voluntary greenhouse gas reductions, increase student awareness and support strong action on climate-change issues through state legislation.
The Maine Climate Campaign, including students from Colby, Bates, Unity, UMF and USM, met after the conference, at Colby College to discuss where the Harvard conference might lead.
Discussion topics included developing criteria for a scorecard that would make it possible to measure the progress Maine schools are making toward specific greenhouse gas reduction goals. Such a scorecard might encourage Maine’s colleges and universities to use cleaner energy.
Scorecard criteria may include: the number of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Certified (LEED) buildings on a campus, an institution’s fleet fuel efficiency, whether or not a school has completed an energy audit, recycling rates for paper, metals and other materials, pounds of food waste per student, percent of local and sustainable food used in dining services, per capita water use, and student housing electricity use in kilowatt hours/capita.
USM’s score may prove a challenge to other schools. USM climate change initiatives include: hiring sustainability coordinators for residential life, replacing its motorpool fleet with hybrid-electric vehicles, installing a ground source heat pump to heat and cool the new community education center. There is also a student Biodiesel Initiative and university energy audit being led by Sarah Ferriter ’04.
The next meeting of the Maine Climate Campaign is scheduled for May 1 at Colby. For more information contact Sean Neely ([email protected]) or visit the website www.climatecampaign.org. Get involved today for “The Way Air Should Be.”