Colleges lead on going 'carbon-neutral'

MIDDLEBURY, Vt. --Middlebury College plans to get half its space heating by burning gas created from the wood of locally grown willow trees.

The University of Vermont is conducting an inventory of its emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, with an eye toward reducing them as much as possible and investing in efforts to reduce greenhouse gases elsewhere.

Green Mountain College in Poultney last fall began getting half its electricity from generators powered by methane gas extracted from cow manure.

All three colleges are involved in a national movement to become "carbon-neutral," ensuring that they're responsible for no more greenhouse gas emissions than they're eliminating on campus or elsewhere.

A group of students at Middlebury decided to focus on the school's heating system because, "Space heating and cooling, including domestic hot water heating, is responsible for about 80.2 percent of Middlebury College's carbon footprint," according to a proposal they drafted for going carbon-neutral.

This month saw the launch of the American College & University Presidents Climate Commitment, a campaign to get signatories to pledge to meet carbon reduction goals. Within one year, they agree to have their institutions do complete inventories of carbon emissions -- everything from heating and cooling to staff and students driving to campus. Within two years, the schools are to set target dates for going carbon-neutral and have a plan to do so.

Tony Cortese, president of Second Nature, a nonprofit that is coordinating the colleges' campaign, said getting schools around the country to go carbon-neutral would address just a small fraction of emissions tied to global warming.

But he added that by participating, the colleges would be planting the idea in the minds of their students, who will then go out into the larger society and look for ways to reduce emissions elsewhere.

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Information from: The Burlington Free Press, http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com