View the slide show presented on November 19th by Smith College Sustainability Director Dano Weisbord and Elisabeth Wolfe, '10.
For more information, call (413) 585-2427 or e-mail
dweisbord@smith.edu.
As Smith College and the rest of the country search for alternative energy sources, a team of students, faculty and staff members traveled to Vermont recently to tour a wind farm. Power generated by wind is becoming an increasingly viable option and, as a clean, renewable source of energy, is of particular interest to Smith students.
On a beautiful autumn Saturday, Sept. 20, Smith students, accompanied by Denise McKay, assistant professor of engineering, and the college’s Green Team, toured Green Mountain Power’s wind farm in Searsburg, Vt. When it came online, the Searsburg facility was the largest in New England.
The array of wind turbines at Green Mountain Power sits atop a 2,500-foot ridgeline on 35 acres of privately owned land abutting national forest property. Tour guides explained the lengthy collaborative processes required to develop the facility, as well as the engineering involved in construction and computer monitoring of the huge turbines and steel towers that support them.
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For their extraordinary professional achievements and outstanding service to their communities, five alumnae will receive the Smith College Medal, an award presented each February on Rally Day.
Beginning at 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 18, in Sweeney Concert Hall, Sage Hall, honored alumnae will receive the medals, an event that is free and open to the public.
The Smith College Medal was established in 1962 to recognize alumnae “who, in the judgment of the trustees, exemplify in their lives and work the true purpose of a liberal arts education.”
Preeti Simran Sethi ’92, environmental journalist
Preeti Simran Sethi is the contributing environmental correspondent for CNBC and the Lacy C. Haynes Visiting Professional Chair at the University of Kansas School of Journalism and Mass Communications, where she teaches courses on environmental communications. Sethi is writing a book on environmental equity for Harper Collins and is the contributing author of “Ethical Markets: Growing the Green Economy,” winner of a bronze 2008 Axiom Business Book Award. She is the co-host and writer of Sundance Channel's environmental programming, “The Green,” and the creator of the Sundance Web series, “The Good Fight,” highlighting global environmental justice efforts and grassroots activism.
Named one of the top ten eco-heroes of the planet by the United Kingdom's Independent and lauded as the “environmental messenger” by Vanity Fair and environmental “Woman of Impact” by Variety, Sethi is committed to a redefinition of environmentalism that includes voices from the prairie, the inner-city and the global community. She has contributed segments to “Nightly News with Brian Williams,” the “Today Show,” the “Oprah Winfrey Show,” the “Ellen DeGeneres Show” and the “Martha Stewart Show.” She has been a featured guest on National Public Radio and is the host of the Emmy Award-winning PBS documentary “A School in the Woods.”
To read the entire news release click here.
Student interest in composting the leftover food in their dining rooms led to a successful program in two campus kitchens last year that recently expanded to a third.Now, uneaten food from the Cutter-Ziskind, Chase-Duckett and Tyler houses is taken regularly to a Westhampton farm where it is used to fertilize crops. The farm grows hay and corn and raises beef cattle on 200 acres.
Each month, about a ton of compost is produced per kitchen, said Roger Guzowski,
Five College recycling manager, adding, “that is material that does not go into the landfill.”
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Last year at this time, Smith’s dining services joined a national movement to steer consumers away from buying and immediately discarding
bottled water by introducing college-customized water bottles. The bottles, colored a deep, Smith blue, became a popular tote-along among students and others, with their convenient carrying loops, and replaced bottled water at the Chapin Grab-and-Go.
Students lauded the elimination of the wasteful commercial plastic water bottles. This August, dining services has taken the carry-along water bottle a step further with the unveiling of a bright orange or blue, aluminum bottle with a solid, flat bottom and easy-to-use screw top.
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Well into its first summer of cultivation, the Smith College Community Garden, an initiative begun by students last year, is producing a healthy list of edibles using sustainable methods.
The community garden, a series of plots organized near the Center for Early Childhood Education (CECE) on Lyman Road, is a collective effort. Periodic work parties have gathered an assortment of students, faculty and staff members for weeding, watering and other gardening.
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Click here for more information.
June 25, 2008– As part of its orientation for new students, Smith College is going beyond the perennial sessions about how to select courses or navigate the housing lottery. This year, incoming students have the chance learn how to minimize their environmental impact on and off campus.
The new pre-orientation program, open to about 30 students and titled “Sustainability and Ecological Literacy,” will run from August 28 to 30.
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June 25, 2008– As part of its commitment to the environment, Smith College recently created the position of environmental sustainability director and has appointed Amherst resident Dano Weisbord to the post.
Weisbord will begin at Smith on August 11, leaving his position as senior project manager at the Boston firm CLF Ventures, a non-profit consulting branch of the Conservation Law Foundation where he also worked as an environmental policy fellow.
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April 3, 2008- Anyone passing by Smith College on Saturday night might have been surprised to find a completely dark campus.
The lack of lights was part of a global movement called Earth Hour going on across the country from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. on March 29. Millions of people across the world turned out their lights to call for action on climate change.
Click here to continue reading Smith Sophian article by Angela Zhu
February 7, 2008- Early-rising students received a cold shower of dire reality at the keynote speech of Focus the Nation, the student-organized day of educational and collaborative talks on global warming on Thursday, Jan. 31 in Weinstein Auditorium.
Michael Klare, Five College professor of peace & world security studies gave his speech titled "Global Warming: the Human Dimension". The lecture outlined how and why global warming should be considered an urgent issue of national security, instead of an environmental concern.
Click here to continue reading Smith Sophian article by Zoe Macintosh
November 26, 2007- Smith College President Carol T. Christ recently signed an agreement to reduce the college’s carbon emissions, joining higher education leaders nationwide. The agreement, called the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment, is an effort to address global warming by neutralizing greenhouse gas emissions.
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With funds from a cooperative that includes Smith College,
Northeast Biodiesel Company recently purchased 26.5 acres in Greenfield to construct a plant
that will convert vegetable oil to fuel. When it is built, the $5.85 million plant will turn
used vegetable oil into a fuel that can be used in heating systems and diesel vehicles such as
school buses, snowplows and trucks.
To read the Grecourt Gate News article, click
here. To read the Press Announcement from Co-op Power, click
here.
Smith College students are finding an increasing abundance
of locally grown food on campus menus this fall. As a new member of the "Be a Local Hero Buy
Locally Grown" campaign, run by Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture (CISA), Dining Services
has increased the amount of locally grown food it purchases from area farmers. Click
here to continue reading.
This semester students were welcomed back to campus with
new water bottles. The bottles, along with the elimination of bottled water at Chapin Grab-and-Go,
are part of a new push to wean Smith College students from bottled water. U.S. bottled water
requires more than 1.5 million barrels of oil annually. Nearly 60 million plastic bottles end
up in landfills and incinerators every day.
Click here to
read the full article.
Did you know that Smith College uses a 10%
biodiesel blend (B-10) in its diesel fuel fleet? Click
here to learn more about food, water, and energy at Smith College. Web site created
by Hallie Applebaum '10 and Hannah Belsky '10 for "The Science and Politics
of Food, Water, and Energy," a first-year seminar taught by Leslie King and
Paul Wetzel.
Smith College continues to shape its sustainability
efforts, developing data and cost analyses for numerous projects that will promote
conservation -- and further the 30 percent reduction in energy use already achieved.
Those efforts range from the simple to the complex. Read
more...
Smith is considering the creation of a Center
for the Environment, Ecological Design, and Sustainability that will catalyze efforts
to deepen understanding and appreciation of the environment and to provide inspiration,
opportunities and resources to work toward an environmentally sustainable world.
The center will foster and support imaginative and forward-thinking collaborations
that bridge the natural and social sciences, the arts and humanities, and engineering
to address questions and problems related to the environment.
On Wednesday, April 14, 2004, Smith President
Carol T. Christ, together with Allen Curran, Professor of Geology, Director of the
Environmental Science and Policy Program and Chair of the Sustainability Committee,
signed a voluntary partnership agreement with Clean Air-Cool Planet, pledging the
college to work toward reducing greenhouse gases in its operations and to promote
awareness among its students, faculty and staff of the importance of responsible
environmental stewardship.
Clean Air-Cool Planet (CA-CP) is the region's
leading organization dedicated to finding and promoting solutions to global warming.
CA-CP partners with campuses, communities, and companies throughout the Northeast
to help reduce their carbon emissions. They showcase practical climate solutions
that demonstrate the economic opportunities and environmental benefits associated
with early actions on climate change and advocate the implementation of effective
policy solutions aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions at the state and regional
levels.
Elizabeth Thomas '05 compiled nearly 15 years
of emissions data into a comprehensive report on Smith's greenhouse gas production
entitled "Greenhouse Gas Emissions at Smith College: A Comprehensive Inventory
from 1990-2004 and Suggestions to Reduce Future Emissions." This inventory
was part of Smith's 2004 agreement with Clean Air-Cool Planet.
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