2008 Woodie Awards
Miami makes additional efforts to go green
Kellyn Moran
Issue date: 8/26/08 Section: Campus
Miami University may be a campus of red bricks and beige Georgian facades, but administrators are hoping to make campus green.
The Task Force on Environmental Sustainability, appointed by President David Hodge, worked through the summer to create its final report. The idea for the task force was spearheaded by alumnae Kate Waller and has since grown into a community dialogue on the issue of environmental sustainability.
A town hall meeting was held late April and the task force's preliminary recommendations were posted on the president's Web site in the spring. Since then, any additional feedback received is being added as an appendix to the report.
Energy management engineer and task force co-chair Tony Ferraro said the final report should be delivered to the president's office by the end of the week.
Ferraro said the university is not new to the eco-friendly movement. Already, steps have been taken to complete variable speed drives, lighting retrofits and insulation upgrades among other energy efficient changes on campus.
However, this can be a disadvantage when Miami tries to meet the demands of state and national legislation.
Miami completed several energy savings projects before 2007, when House Bill 251 was passed. The bill required public universities in Ohio to decrease energy use by 20 percent during the time period 2004-2014.
"(For) another university that may have not done that much (before 2004, meeting 20 percent) is going to be a lot easier for them than it is for us, because we've done … all those things (before 2004) that now another 20 percent on top of that will be slightly difficult to get (for Miami)," Ferraro said.
Mark Boardman, director of the Institute of Environmental Studies at Miami and member of the task force, said that while measurements of increased energy efficiency at the university are important, their importance should not be exaggerated.
"There's a concern that I have that… we are detaching ourselves from our individual responsibility to make the small individual choices that are going to matter," Boardman said.
The Task Force on Environmental Sustainability, appointed by President David Hodge, worked through the summer to create its final report. The idea for the task force was spearheaded by alumnae Kate Waller and has since grown into a community dialogue on the issue of environmental sustainability.
A town hall meeting was held late April and the task force's preliminary recommendations were posted on the president's Web site in the spring. Since then, any additional feedback received is being added as an appendix to the report.
Energy management engineer and task force co-chair Tony Ferraro said the final report should be delivered to the president's office by the end of the week.
Ferraro said the university is not new to the eco-friendly movement. Already, steps have been taken to complete variable speed drives, lighting retrofits and insulation upgrades among other energy efficient changes on campus.
However, this can be a disadvantage when Miami tries to meet the demands of state and national legislation.
Miami completed several energy savings projects before 2007, when House Bill 251 was passed. The bill required public universities in Ohio to decrease energy use by 20 percent during the time period 2004-2014.
"(For) another university that may have not done that much (before 2004, meeting 20 percent) is going to be a lot easier for them than it is for us, because we've done … all those things (before 2004) that now another 20 percent on top of that will be slightly difficult to get (for Miami)," Ferraro said.
Mark Boardman, director of the Institute of Environmental Studies at Miami and member of the task force, said that while measurements of increased energy efficiency at the university are important, their importance should not be exaggerated.
"There's a concern that I have that… we are detaching ourselves from our individual responsibility to make the small individual choices that are going to matter," Boardman said.
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