Why higher education leadership for the environment in Virginia is important

“NWF started the Campus Ecology Program back in 1989, Mr. Lyon explained, because NWF knew higher education needs to lead the solutions to the conservation and wildlife challenges we are facing and to ensure that the graduates of today are prepared to lead the solutions of tomorrow.”

Colleges and universities, he explained, are places where people from all walks of life expect to see solutions demonstrated in practice, whether wind turbines, solar panels or electric recharge stations. Hands-on conservation and sustainability go hand-in-hand with the curriculum.

Campuses, clean economy and healthy wildlife connections in Virginia

“It is no longer business as usual for protecting wildlife, explained Lyon. We can’t simply set aside land and water, or regulate for clean air and clean water, although all of that is critical. We also have to look upstream to the impacts on wildlife and habitats- and there we can see that it is our building choices, our energy choices, our transportation choices and all of those need to be overhauled for a clean, safe, 21st Century.”

Reducing carbon pollution to zero within the lifetimes of Virginia college students today

“The challenge to society is to reduce carbon pollution to nearly zero before 2050, or within the lifetimes of most college students today,” Lyon explained. “This means that we are not talking here about being trained to recycle aluminum cans, although that is certainly a part of the solution. We are talking here about a much larger shift- educating students to scale solutions to the scope of the problem.”

“While this can be a daunting challenge,” admitted Jim, “it is the conservation fight of a lifetime.  The fact is 99% of scientists overwhelming agree human reliance on fossil fuels is destabilizing the climate. Is this the legacy we want to leave our children or even the current generations of students today?”

How Virginia colleges and other universities are leading

Jim highlighted several examples of higher education leadership in Virginia, including:

• Dabney S. Lancaster Community College’s Wind Turbine Service Technology program prepares individuals for career entry and advancement opportunities in the advanced technology applications of wind energy technologies.
• Randolph College has an organic garden & orchard, an extensive recycling center that accepts CFLs, electronics, CDs, DVDs, in addition to glass, plastic, aluminum and cardboard. Through NWF’s partner, the American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC), Randolph has commitment to reduce the campus’s carbon footprint through energy efficiency, renewable energy, and other strategies.
• George Mason University’s (GMU) Board of Visitors, in 2007, pledged that the university would build all new construction to a higher environmental standard, specifically, LEED Silver certification level. In addition to two certified National Wildlife Habitats, GMU has purchases 10% of its annual electricity through wind powered Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs), avoiding over 17 million pounds of CO2 emissions, which is like taking almost 1,500 cars off the road for a year or like powering 963 homes for a year!
• Northern Virginia Community College is committed to green building. NVCC’s newly-opened Student Services Building on the Annandale campus recently received their LEED certification award (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design); the student services building is the first LEED Certified building at NVCC. More of NVCC’s campuses will feature LEED buildings soon – Manassas, Woodbridge campuses, etc.
• Thomas Nelson Community College installed two solar panels to power the lights, ventilation and battery chargers for its motorcycle storage containers used for the campus’s motorcycle safety courses) that are located adjacent to a campus parking lot.

Virginia students gain some greener career insights

These kinds of programs help students prepare for a growing array of greener career opportunities throughout Virginia, he noted.  Drawing on labor market studies developed through the Greenforce Initiative (a partnership with Jobs for the Future and National Wildlife Federation sponsored by the Bank of America Charitable Trust at 100 community colleges in six states), Lyon highlighted some of the Virginia specific job trends of relevance to students.

For example, some of the top green jobs by category in Virginia, include pollution reduction, removal & remediation (with 3402 postings), energy efficiency (with 2148 postings), and natural resource conservation (with 1859 postings). Among the top 10 green skills in Virginia, Lyon explained, are scheduling, HVAC, and inspection, while the leading green certifications in Virginia, include professional engineers, certified safety professionals and certified energy managers.

“We’ll need solar financers, project managers and installers and an array of other renewable energy technologies in Virginia,” explained Lyon, including offshore wind. We’ll also need people skilled in climate mitigation and adaptation,  restoring habitat and protecting biodiversity for people and wildlife.”

***

Smart Grid to Battery Storage:

These were among the topics deliberated by 45 national workforce and education thought leaders who convened this week at the Pew Conference Center in Washington, DC for “Sustainability Skills Matter,” a meeting hosted by the Greenforce Initiative, a joint-program of the National Wildlife Federation’s Campus Ecology Program and Jobs for the Future with support from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation.  The meeting was co-sponsored by the American Association of Community College’s SEED Center and the Center on Wisconsin Strategy (COWS).

“We are seeing a shift in the economy,” observed Kevin Coyle, vice president for education and training at the National Wildlife Federation, but it is in its infancy; we need to be prepared across multiple sectors and our leaders need to be educated.  A smarter grid is one example: $150 billion per year is lost on power outages across the grid.  Battery storage, transportation- will also change soon.”

Brenda Dan-Messier, assistant secretary United States Department of Education, noted that efforts such as this convening help the US ”implement President Obama’s inaugural statement that, ‘We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations.”‘

Linking Colleges and Strengthening Credentials:

“Connecting community colleges via public transport to the local town or city would be a key way to reduce CO2 emissions and congestion,” explained architect and transportation planner, Susan Herre. ”It would also introduce young people early on to the walk-transit lifestyle, making them more discerning consumers of neighborhood types as they choose where to work and live after graduation.”

To effectively advance projects like these along with students’ skill sets, Jane Weissman, president and CEO of the Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC), encouraged community colleges to offer industry-vetted credentials.

State and System-wide Skills Evaluation:

In addition to offering credentials in specialized industries, Rob Holsten, dean of continuing education and sustainability at Wilson Community College in North Carolina, described the “system-wide curriculum review process undertaken in North Carolina to better align education across multiple disciplines with today’s economy, including adding employer competencies and creating a common core for all technical programs.”

Workforce Priorities for Sustainability Emerge:

Employers, industry association, higher education and ngo leaders from agriculture, renewable energy, manufacturing and transportation sectors, developed more than 150 ideas in nine categories, including ways to deepen engagement with employers, support community college capacity, link the classroom to real-world project experience, increase awareness to expand demand for sustainability skills and improve labor market information.

Eight key recommendations emerged through an on-line comment, prioritization and voting system administered by FacilitatePro.  Among these were:

1. Engaging leading employers to better inform community and other colleges about the sustainability skills they value and want.
2. Integrating sustainability skills into every career pathway.
3. Providing more paid internship programs, mentoring and apprenticeships and other “hands on” training opportunities for students so they can demonstrate skills, knowledge and abilities.
4. Using campus-based projects as an opportunity to teach real-world application of sustainability skills for students.
5. Exploring opportunities to help businesses make their operations more sustainable and linking education and training around sustainability skills to this.
6. Working with economic development groups to identify sustainability skills needed by new potential employers in a region.
7. Connecting sustainability skills to existing state efforts to recruit manufacturing employers and connecting community colleges to these employers for skills development and work experience or employment opportunities, and
8. Identifying industries with an aging workforce and encouraging them to protect the future competitiveness of their industry by partnering with colleges to redesign and redeliver more effective training program (noting the example of PG&E in CA providing internships and apprenticeships together with 27 community colleges.)

“Ultimately, with the help of our community colleges and employers,” said Coyle, “values and attitudes will change and we will have a kinder, gentler and cleaner world.”

NWF’s Jeremy Symons helps students at the University of Mary Washington connect the dots between Sandy, Dirty Energy and their Future.

“Climate change is putting hurricanes on steroids,” he explained.  “Climate change doesn’t create storms, but it makes them stronger and bigger and we have a responsibility to do something about it.  Carbon pollution from smokestacks and tailpipes is throwing our climate out of balance, and the severe storms, droughts, wildfires, and floods we are experiencing are the new normal as a result.”

Symons showed the students maps of the unusually warm Atlantic ocean temperatures that preceded Sandy, noting that hurricanes gather energy from warm waters, as happened with Hurricane Katrina in 2005.  He also noted that warmer air is holding more water, and that sea levels at Battery Park in New York have risen by almost a foot in the past century, amplifying the storm surge that swamped the city and the coastline.

Symons explained why National Wildlife Federation is concerned about climate’s impacts on the survival of species, which is jeopardized by our growing dependence on fossil fuels even though cleaner energy alternatives are already available and within reach. He also explained how NWF is working with its 4 million members and supporters to foster a shift towards clean, renewable energy, coupled with cleaner transportation and energy efficiency.

Putting a price on carbon pollution, he explained, is one of the most important measures we can take to create the market incentives that would make clean energy profitable and more rapidly replace fossil fuels. In response to a question from a student, he also noted that there is much in Virginia we can do to boost incentives for energy efficiency, and that Dominion Power needs to do more to open opportunities for Mary Washington and other institutions to use cleaner, safer forms of renewable energy.

One of the benefits of student and higher education engagement around energy choices and policy, Symons explained, is strengthening America’s economy with more good jobs for graduates, illustrating relative job creation through the clean energy versus the fossil fuels economies.

Dr. Melanie Szulczewski, a professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at University of Mary Washington, helped to organize this event.

Many of the students in the classes who attended the lecture are studying environmental regulation and earth sciences and when asked, “How many of you are looking forward to a career in the clean energy economy?” nearly all of the approximately 50 students present raised their hands.Helping to organize and host NWF and Mr. Symons were Dr. Melanie Szulczewski, a professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, and Graham Givens, one of the leaders of the Student Ecology club on campus.

About Climate Change, Weather and Wildlife, See other NWF Posts:

• Jeremy Symons:  What Is Causing Our Climate to Unravel?
• Amanda Staudt:  How is Climate Change Fueling Sandy?
• Kevin Coyle:  Hurricane Sandy’s Impact on Fish and Wildlife
• Jennifer Janssen:  How Arctic Sea Ice Loss Can Set the Stage for Superstorms
• Joe Mendelson:  Sandy’s Mandate:  When Political Reality Meets Climate Reality

About How Students in Higher Education Are Leading for Clean Energy, See NWF Resources:

• Campus Ecology Dirty Energy Politics Resources
• Student Tar Sands Action
• Campus Ecology Resources:  Campus Sustainability Case Studies, and past Campus Ecology reports
• Campuses Divest from Fossil Fuels

Like Campus Ecology on Facebook and follow @CampusEcology and @YouthforClimate on Twitter.

Green Campus Financing Advances

It was a watershed moment for campus and other sustainability enthusiasts because it illustrated just how far college and university leaders have come since financing tools were limited, when simple payback was the primary measure of the value of campus sustainability projects, and when savings from energy efficiency and conservation projects were generally lost to campuses’ or organizations’ general fund.

Addressing Disincentives to Conservation on Campus

Green revolving loan funds will help correct some of the unnecessary financial disincentives to conserve natural resources, it is expected, while adding a relatively new approach to the financial toolkit. So far, results are promising.
Last year, SEI released the report, Greening the Bottom Line, illustrating how 52 colleges and universities of all types and sizes all across the US are revolving savings from energy efficiency and other green campus efforts back into funds that finance additional conservation initiatives. Green revolving loan funds (GRFs) replenish through savings that are captured and reinvested in additional conservation programs.

Large Financial Returns for Going Green on Campus

Agnes Scott College President Kiss Presents Luncheon Keynote

SEI also found that students, administrators and facilities were about equally likely to serve as the initial promoters and champions of the existing GRFs and that both student fees (generated through referenda in which students vote generate a few dollars per term to campus sustainability activities) and administrative funding played leading roles in starting many of the funds.

“Billion Dollar Challenge” Spurs Progress

Mark Orlowski, founder and Executive Director of SEI, shared with summit attendees that “thirty-five higher education institutions have so far collectively pledged $83 million to their green revolving funds as part of the “Billion Dollar Green Challenge,” a new campaign SEI launched at the AASHE conference in October 2011.”

Among them is Agnes Scott College (my alma mater), which has committed to securing $1 million for its green fund. During her keynote presentation, Agnes Scott College President, Elizabeth Kiss, shared how support from SEI with implementation of a green revolving loan could help colleges advance sustainability objectives, particularly through help from consultation, case studies and tracking software.

GRITS Offers Assistance

SEI representatives demonstrated the new Green Revolving Investment Tracking System (GRITS), which is designed to help manage the many projects involved in green revolving fund, and will be made available to campus members of the “Billion Dollar Challenge.” Background on this campaign, case studies on successful green revolving funds at nine colleges and universities, an implementation guide and an investment primer are available on SEI’s website.

Harvard's Sustainability Director, Heather Henriksen, Describes Green Returns

Additional Articles about Green Campus Financing Tools:

New Financing Tools Help Push for Green Campuses (review of Financing Sustainability on Campus by the National Association of College and University Business Officers, NACUBO)

Reflections on the Financing the Future of Energy Efficiency Summit by sustainability leader, Mitchell Thomashow

Harvard Leads Green Challenge with $12 Million, by Alyza J. Sebenius, quotes Harvard Sustainability Director, Heather Henriksen

(NWF’s Campus Ecology Program proudly joins more than one  dozen organizations in co-sponsoring the Greening the Bottom Line report and in serving on the invitation committee for the Financing the Future of Energy Efficiency Summit. Our work is made possible through generous donations from NWF members, The Kendeda Fund, Bank of America Charitable Foundation, NASA and private donors. NWF’s Campus Ecology Program empowers student leaders to advance sustainability across the higher education curriculum, operations, and wider community.)

NWF Board Member Forges Link

SAIGE 2012 encourages young professionals, copyright Jeff Barehand

Clean Energy, Sustainable Water Top List of Concerns

When asked, “What green campus issues matter to you?” students identified three priority topics: sustainable use of water, clean energy and reducing waste. For each of the three topics, at least one student rated his or her campus as making an excellent effort in that area, allowing students to identify and partner with one another to strengthen projects. We placed ourselves physically along an imaginary “sustainability continuum” to help visualize the status of various efforts, to encourage movement and diversify the workshop format.

The workshop aimed to give SAIGE student leaders a deeper understanding of:

1. The national scope of the higher education for sustainability movement and how Native American young people as well as tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) are leading the movement;
2. Why environmental (or sustainability) education makes a difference in academic success and student well being; and
3. An especially effective approach to peer-to-peer coaching (GROW) that can help identify and further personal and professional goals.

Tribal Colleges and Universities Leading Provide Green Campus Models

Judging from the discussion, most of the student participants were unaware of just how boldly some of their peers are leading.  For example, they learned about clean energy innovation at Blackfeet Community College in Browning, MT, which is generating 50% of its electricity from wind and efforts at College of Menominee Nation, where all students take a course on sustainable development (See: Kuslikis and Beau Mitchell for additional information) as part of their general education requirement and where a position is dedicated to facilitating cross-campus sustainability initiatives.

(A note:  This workshop was an offering of NWF’s Campus Ecology Program which empowers student leaders to green their curricula, campuses and communities).

Afternoon Panel Surveys Green Campus Leadership in So. Korea

What stood out in particular, as a participant, were the level of governmental support demonstrated for greener campuses in Korea, its international approach, the focus on climate change and wildlife sciences, and its large network of energized students.

Government Makes Greener Campuses Priority

The Governors of Gyeonggi-Province and Yongin City and other senior public officials, shared perspectives with attendees on the importance of greener campuses to South Korea and to the larger world. The President of Kangnam University, Yoon Sin-il, highlighted the

“meaningful roles of the green campus movement in assisting with the country’s preparation of environmental policies, sustainable development strategies and measures for addressing climate change.”

Government support has also helped South Korea link to international efforts. Over the past three years, for example, its global green campus forum has brought in university practitioners from at least eleven countries and four continents, including Africa, Asia, Europe and North America.

Kangnam U's Honeywell-designed Green Campus System

From Sustainability Curricula to Sacred Forests

Proceedings illustrate various higher education emphases across countries and continents and highlight exemplary programs that might not otherwise be known as widely as deserved, such as Miriam College in the Philippines, in which the faculty and staff take a

“whole-school approach to sustainability education,” according to presenter, Reyett Paunan, “developing sustainability modules for most courses and implementing policies for campus operations, including the recycling of 80% of the campus’ materials stream and green building standards.”

Sonia Koumba Christelle Gerda, from Gabon, meanwhile, described her research efforts at  Dalian University of Technology in China, focused on a large-scale urban renewal project in Libreville, Gabon, as well as work to  protect and connect the country’s network of thirteen national parks that include biosphere reserves, elephants, and sacred forests.

Low-Carbon Strategies

Green campuses are one of eight national priorities in Korea for addressing climate change science, according to Environment Bureau Director General, Shin-Whoan Park, and also play a role in wildlife and habitat protection and restoration. Professor Si-hu Ju, of Kangnam University, for example, illustrated how the campus is achieving its goals to lead in becoming a low-carbon campus through education for students and staff, a detailed green campus plan with targets and timetables for efficiency and conservation, use of geothermal and other clean energy sources and a recycled water treatment system. The campus also boasts a state-of-the-art resource monitoring and management system designed by Honeywell.

Protecting and restoring wildlife habitat

Green Campus Initiative organizers shared the 2008 report, The Wetlands of Gyeonggi Province, describing Korea’s protection plans and priorities for some 2,000 rivers and streams that provide some of the most important habitats in the world for migratory birds, insectivorous (e.g. carnivorous) plants, and life sustaining water for farmers. Students and faculty, they explained, are key to the research, education and hands-on projects needed to protect and restore these important sanctuaries that hang in the balance as citizens debate the most sustainable approaches to development.

Passionate student leaders for climate solutions

Proud Green Campus Student Leaders in So Korea

The students supported through these various programs presented about how the hundreds of green projects they have lead to date, all across Korea and beyond, are motivated by the need to find solutions to growing global ecological and social problems. They pass out stickers that encourage “turning off power strips and standby power,” “saving every drop of water” and to “remember the millions of people throughout the world who are suffering from shortage of water and the climate refugees whose homeland is turned into desert.”

Fostering International Linkages

Thank you to Korea’s Gyeonggi-do Association for Green Campus Initiative for the honor of inviting me to present a keynote for this year’s forum about how “Ecologically Literate and Engaged Students will Lead the 21st Century,” as well as to Paul Rowland, executive director of the American Association for Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) for connecting Korea’s green campus leadership with National Wildlife Federation’s Campus Ecology Program. It is clear that Korea is working hard to advance green campuses as a national framework for sustainability and, through its higher education leadership and international linkages, is a country to watch as it enlightens the world about what is possible.

Global Green Campus Forum South Korea
Ashwini Srinivasa Presents and Reports on Global Green Campus Forum
Green Campus, Amanda Miu Chung Han, Asia Pacific Business & Technology Report, June 8, 2012

“What I felt was very telling was that many of the young people who attended the event in Cleveland were not up to speed on the pipeline,” says Juliana Goodlaw-Morris, campus ecology manager at the National Wildlife Federation, “however, now more than ever they are ready to take action on their campuses and in their communities.”
For example, when student leaders from all across the U.S. who recently attended the annual conference of the American Association of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) in Pittsburgh, PA, discovered that President Obama would be speaking in the city, they mobilized buses to meet him.

In Ohio, students are organizing at least three trainings to learn how to confront dirty energy projects like the Keystone XL oil pipeline and to advocate for safe, clean energy.

On November 6 at 2 pm (ET) in Washington, DC, students, faculty and staff from dozens of colleges and universities in the Mid-Atlantic region will gather with thousands of other concerned citizens at LaFayette Square in front of the White House to express opposition to the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline and support for clean, safe energy. The President is expected to make a decision on the pipeline proposal in the coming weeks.

Many of the campus leaders are registering for the Nov 6 rally through National Wildlife Federation and will meet up with NWF staff there as well as the staff from Energy Action Coalition and many other sister organizations. Students and others are also submitting hand-written letters to the White House (President Obama is said to read as many as 500 per day), letters to the editor (see Alexandra Costaki’s post with examples), videograms, and online letters.

The college’s announcement recently, covered by Chanel 10 news and local media, that it had become grid positive ahead of schedule, came as a welcome surprise, signaling the first time we are aware of that a campus is generating more electricity through solar photovoltaic panels than they use.

This is significant for the US and world.  As a leading global source of greenhouse gas pollution, the US is in need of models such as Butte’s that provide a path towards a healthy future. This kind of large-scale shift towards cleaner forms of energy not only provides students hands-on opportunities to gain 21st century skills, it also directly boosts local employment providing jobs for displaced workers and newly trained students (e.g. see Butte’s green jobs center).

The impressive solar installation is just one facet of Butte’s sustainability efforts.  They have also diverted a larger percentage of their waste than most campuses, restored a large wildlife habitat area, designed buildings that define new standards for energy efficiency, and operate a transit program that reduces traffic in the community.  They won the national green campus awards-Chill Out- in 2008 (see video) and were also a featured school in the national campus environmental report card detailing trends in higher education management, curriculum and operations for sustainability (both programs of the National Wildlife Federation’s Campus Ecology initiative). They are also a signatory to the prestigious President’s Climate Commitment through which almost 700 US college and university leaders aim to achieve climate neutrality by 2050.

On behalf of our Campus Ecology team and all of my colleagues here at National Wildlife Federation (along with our partners in the Greenforce Initiative at Jobs for the Future), congratulations and thanks to President Van Der Ploeg for having the courage to set such a bold goal for human health and ecology and to Mike Miller, Butte’s director of facilities planning and management, for helping define a new path forward and assisting others at schools all across the US and world along the way.

Drawing on a 2009 study by the Pew Charitable Trusts and other resources, state leaders reviewed at least one dozen policies that can be implemented or strengthened in each state to advance greener jobs and careers, including the following:

1. State tax incentives (Database of state tax incentives for renewable energy (DSIRE) provides a state snapshot.
2. Loan financing (Renewable Energy World highlights one model in Illinois, while Pew’s study, the Clean Energy Economy, indicates 33 states have some form of loan financing for renewable energy)
3. Rebate programs
4. Renewable portfolio standards (U.S. Departmen of Energy provides an interactive state map)
5. University R&D grants (University Clean Energy Alliance of Ohio and R&D Magazine’s search feature provide several good examples)
6. Energy efficiency standards (Pew Center provides a clickable state map with details)
7. Net metering initiatives (35 states)
8. Regional climate and clean energy initiatives (World Resources Center’s clickable map)
9. Vehicle greenhouse gas emission standards (14, plus DC)
10. Smart grid plans (Lisa Schwartz provides an overview from the Regulatory Assistance Program on the Smart Grid Learning Network at the October 2010 National Governor’s Association Conference)
11. Energy audit and disclosure ordinances (Carolyn Sarno of the Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnership provides overview of building energy disclosure laws in Washington and New York in August 2010 issue of OnPeak Performance)
12. State clean energy funds (U.S. EPA’s State Clean Energy Fund Fact Sheet)

Thanks to Jan Jarrett, executive director, PennFuture and Nathan Lott, executive director, Virginia Conservation Network for joining me in facilitating this workshop.