For immediate release
April 15, 2003
MOUNT HOLYOKE COLLEGE TIP SHEET
FOR EARTH DAY, APRIL, 22, 2003
A number of environmentally-friendly initiatives are under way on
the campus of Mount Holyoke College, a highly selective liberal
arts college for women located in South Hadley, Massachusetts. Among
them are:
Green buildings
Mount Holyoke is a leader in environmentally sustainable architecture.
Two major building projects now under way on the campus-the new
science center, which includes the construction of Kendade Hall
and the reconstruction of Carr Laboratory and Shattuck Hall, as
well as the reconstruction of Blanchard Campus Center-are "green
buildings," built in in accordance with Leadership in Energy
and Environmental Design (LEED) criteria established by the United
States Green Building Council. Based on well-founded scientific
standards, LEED emphasizes advanced strategies for sustainable site
development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection,
and indoor environmental quality. MHC is in the vanguard of the
movement toward environmentally responsible building. The science
center was the twenty-third project registered under LEED; today,
there are nearly seven hundred projects on that list. Carr Laboratory
and Kendade Hall are now open; Shattuck Hall and Blanchard Campus
Center are to reopen in the fall. (Contact: John Bryant, director
of facilities management, at 413-538-2058.)
Greening the curriculum
The college has focused on efforts to better employ the campus as
a vast, green laboratory for the study of landscape ecology. Through
its Center for Environmental Literacy, the college has established
curricular trails, campus networks of data collection stations that
give faculty and students access to information about weather, tree
growth, water quality, and even the migration of American eels through
campus waterways as they return to saltwater to spawn. The data
collected on the curricular trails, accessible to anyone who can
use a Web browser, has made possible the study of issues in history,
economics, and a variety of other fields. The CEL has also focused
on developing ways to infuse nonenvironmental courses with environmental
elements, in effect "greening" the curriculum. (Contact:
Thomas Millette, associate professor of geography, at the Center
for Environmental Literacy, 413-538-3091.)
Hybrid vehicles
Two Toyota Prius sedans, earmarked for use by student organizations
and faculty and staff members travelling on College business, joined
the College's fleet earlier this month. Their ground-breaking hybrid
technology-the vehicles automatically switch between a seventy-horsepower
gasoline engine and a forty-four-horsepower electric motor, or use
both in tandem-
allows them to get up to fifty-two miles per gallon of gasoline
while emitting fewer smog-forming emissions. The California Air
Resources Board, the strictest in the nation, has designated the
Prius as a Super Ultra Low Emission Vehicle, emitting 90 percent
fewer tailpipe gases than Ultra Low Emission Vehicles. The vehicles
replace two conventional Ford Taurus sedans retired from the fleet.
(Contact: Paul Ominsky, director of public safety, at 413-538-2304.)
Conservation/recycling
The student-led Campus Conservation Coalition, which works closely
with the Center for Environmental Literacy, is focused on educating
the community about campus wide issues related to recycling, energy,
water conservation, and other pressing environmental concerns. The
group oversees the campus Kill-A-Watt competition, a contest between
the dorms to conserve electricity, and has set up a paper binder
in the library that can be used to create pads from paper with one
blank side that might otherwise be discarded. Through its Volunteer
Days, the CCC gives students an opportunity to come together to
make a difference on campus; one recent project involved researching
and recommending strategic locations for recycling bins. Through
the efforts of the CCC and the Five College Recycyling Program,
corrugated cardboard, cans, bottles, paper, batteries, computer
components, foam packing material, and magnetic computer discs and
other data supplies are removed from the waste stream. (Contact:
Shanti Michaels, CCC, at semichae@mtholyoke.edu, and Angie Fowler,
Five College Recycling Program, at 413-559-5496.)
Safer cleaning products
In the residence halls, traditional chemical cleaners have been
replaced by solutions that are nontoxic, noncorrosive, noncombustible,
and nonreactive. The cleaners, part of Rochester Midland Corporation's
EnviroCare line, contain no hazardous ingredients, glycol ethers,
petroleum distillates, suspected carcinogens, or ozone-depleting
compounds. They are also free of phosphates, which can kill life
in rivers, streams, and oceans by causing "algae blooms,"
and are less expensive as the chemicals they replace. Rochester
Midland is the first company in the world to be certified by Green
Seal, an independent nonprofit organization that identifies products
and services that cause less toxic pollution and waste, conserve
resources and habitats, and minimize global warming and ozone depletion.
(Contact: Dave Williams, supervisor of environmental services, at
413-538-2861.)
Global agreements
In 2000, Mount Holyoke signed the Talloires Declaration of the
Association of University Leaders for a Sustainable Future, joining
an international network of more than 290 institutions of higher
learning committed to promoting education for sustainability and
environmental literacy. Named for Talloires, France, where twenty-two
university leaders met ten years ago to voice their concerns about
the state of the world, the declaration provides a comprehensive
planning framework and constitutes a commitment to which the institution
can be held accountable over time. (See more at www.ulsf.org.)
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