Green Colleges

Guest Essay

Green Colleges

Noel Perrin

Noel Perrin is an adjunct professor of environmental studies at Dartmouth College. He has owned three electric cars and currently drives a gasoline-electric hybrid car.

About 1100 American colleges and universities run at least a token environmental studies program, and many hundreds of these programs offer well-designed and useful courses.

But only a drastically smaller number practice even a portion of what they preach. The one exception is recycling. Nearly every institution that offers so much as one lonely environmental studies course also does a little half-hearted recycling—usually paper and glass.

There are, I'm glad to say, some glorious exceptions to these rather churlish observations. How many? Nobody knows. But it is possible to make an educated guess. I believe that somewhere close to a hundred colleges and universities are helping lead the United States toward a more sustainable future. If our culture adjusts in time, these hundred will have been one of the reasons why. Here is a sampling of what the hundred do. I give them in no special order.

Michigan State University: Many colleges and universities purchase recycled paper. Well, somewhat recycled. If you look closely, the recycled content (post-consumer) turns out to be 30 percent, 20 percent, maybe just 10 percent. Michigan State does strikingly better. The university's aim is to buy only paper made from 100% post-consumer pulp. Not every office within the university cooperates in this effort. But the majority do. As far as I know, only the University of Buffalo has so far joined Michigan State in shooting for 100%.
Channel Islands is a new subsidiary of California State University. When it inherited its campus, it got 45 gasoline powered service vehicles thrown in as a part of the deal. The University now owns 48 service vehicles. But the mix is quite different. The current fleet includes: 1 propane-powered dump truck, 6 compressed natural gas vehicles, 26 electric vehicles, and finally 15 relics from the past—the last 15 gas vehicles.
Marlboro College in Vermont is "in the process of taking up the majority of the pavement that wends through the central campus, greening it over, and making the central campus a car-free zone."
Wisconsin’s Northland may not be the only institution to have both solar panels and a windmill on top of its newest dormitory, but it probably is the only one to have installed composting toilets. (There are conventional flush ones nearby, but the college says the composters get the most use.)
At Ohio’s Oberlin College, students and faculty participated in designing a more sustainable environmental studies building.
New York’s Cornell University recently completed what I think to be the largest green project yet done in this country. Cost: $60 million. First purpose:: to eliminate conventional air conditioning on the Cornell campus while keeping campus buildings cool and comfortable all summer. Second purpose: radical reduction Cornell-caused pollution. The project, completed in the year 2000, has been a striking success. The new system, which uses the cold deep waters of Lake Cayuga, takes only one-fifth as much electricity to run as did the old system. There is essentially no pollution at all, except that caused by the generation of a 20% electricity load.
At North Carolina’s Catawba College students have found ways to recycle 98% of the construction debris from the college's newly built Center for the Environment.
Kentucky’s Berea College is building what it calls Ecovillage: 32 units of housing intended primarily for married students. Among the plans for Ecovillage: reduce energy use by 75%, reduce per capita water use by 75%, and convert sewage to swimmable quality water.
Duke University in North collects 17 kinds of recyclables from 630 locations. A permanent work force of six, assisted by a dozen work-study students does the collecting.
Tulane University in Louisiana has developed the usual programs in recycling, composting, and energy efficiency that one expects from a green college. But what sets Tulane apart is the Environmental Law Clinic. Third-year law students, backed up by three law fellows who are practicing attorneys, staff it. The clinic does legal work for environmental organizations across Louisiana. "It most likely has had a greater environmental impact than all our other efforts combined," says Elizabeth Davey, Tulane's first-ever environmental coordinator.
At New York’s Vassar College the VASSAR Greens, a student-founded, student-run organization with about 150 members, is the principal engine of change at Vassar. The Greens staff an education committee, a composting committee, a recycling committee, and a sustainability committee.
Hampshire College in Massachusetts is one of at least 20 rural colleges that have established organic farms. But it has probably the biggest and most ambitious project with a 61-hectare (150-acre) working farm. The farm grows 4 hectares (10 acres) of organic vegetables and berries, has a herb garden, offers classes, has a student-run food co-op
.University of California, Davis is a bicyclist's paradise. There are 23 kilometers (14 miles) of bike paths on campus, and another 72 kilometers (45 miles) of bike paths in the small city of Davis. Bike commuting, like clean air, is routine. What happens on rainy days? "A surprising number continue to bike," says David Takemoto-Weerts, coordinator of the university's bicycle program. There are also buses.
New Jersey’s Princeton University generates about (11 metric tons) 12 tons a month of edible food waste. This food is not only edible, it gets eaten. Pigs eat it. Princeton has been supplying a local piggery since 1995 - and so far has provided about 1,000 tons of top quality pig rations. There is no cost to the piggery and no charge to Princeton. On green campuses that's how it should be.

Critical Thinking

On a scale of 1 to 10, what environmental rating would you give to your school? Compare your rating with those of other members of your class.

2.List the three most important things needed to improve your school’s environmental rating.