Energy & Climate Change

The Big Turn Off In November of 2006, President Creighton launched 'The Big Turn Off', "for reasons both global and local, we want Mount Holyoke to minimize its eneregy consumption." Help us save, reduce the cost of energy use on campus, the campuses environemntal footprint, and reliance on non-renewable energy. The greenest energy is the energy not used.
Mount Holyoke's Climate Commitment In June of 2004, Mount Holyoke formally joined the fight against global warming by entering into a partnership with Clean Air-Cool Planet, a leading organization in the region dedicated to finding and promoting solutions to global warming. The College has developed and maintains a Greenhouse Gas Inventory of direct emissions of green house gases, electrical use, fuel use for heating, and fuel use for fleet transportation going back to 1990. In signing this agreement, the College agreed to set a target for Greenhouse Gas reductions consistent with those established by the 2001 Regional Climate Action Plan adopted by the governors of the six New England states and the premiers of the five eastern Canadian Provinces. The Plan established short term goals of reducing Greenhouse Gas emissions throughout the region to 1990 levels by 2010 and to a level 10% below 1990 levels by 2020.
Green Computing Make those other computers green with envy! Save energy and the environment by practicing green computing.
Administrative & Academic Kill-a-Watt How Much electricity does your building use? Join the student's monthly quest to maximize energy efficiency and minimize energy waste.
Give the Energy Hogs a Break! There's nothing you need to leave on while you're away.

Campus Energy

Where Does Campus Electricity Come From? Find out how the campus fits into the electric grid.
MHC Energy Use Energy use since 1990 corrected for total building square footage.
MHC Energy Cost Energy cost since 1990 corrected for total building square footage.
Residence Hall Heating Systems Tips on how to make your heating system work for you.

Energy Conservation and Efficiency

Occupancy Sensors Occupancy sensors reduce energy consumption by automatically shutting off lights when rooms are empty.
Heating and Cooling Policy Target temperature for academic and administrative areas during the heating season.
Residence Hall Kill-a-Watt Competition The Kill-a-Watt Energy Conservation Competition is one of the nation's longest running programs for reducing college students' ecological footprints.
Science Energy Recovery System In early 2007, an energy recovery loop was installed in the science complex to reclaim heating and cooling energy from the building exhaust.
Howard Gym Renovation Mount Holyoke undertook the retrofit of gymnasium lighting in Summer 2005.
ECO-Friendly Offices Small actions repeated every day can significantly reduce the environmental impact of your work.
Keep it Cold, But Save the Juice! A soda machine, which runs 24/7, uses a lot of energy, about 10 times the electricity of a home refrigerator.
Energy Myth Busters The energy crisis has given rise to a growing set of energy myths.

Transportation