I hate feeling bad for using my computer. Or turning on the lights. Or taking a hot shower. But I can’t help but feel guilty, when the electricity Wesleyan uses, every minute of every day, pumps tons of pollution and greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. We’re powered by burning fossil fuels (coal, oil, natural gas), from the stage lights of Crowell to the kitchens of Mocon to the heater in your room. Fossil fuels are difficult to extract, often requiring the destruction of natural areas to reach deposits that are depleted quickly. When burned, they release particulate matter and chemicals that decrease air quality and cause health problems, not to mention carbon dioxide, the most notorious greenhouse gas. Not only that, but buying fossil fuels empowers the energy industry, quite possibly the most evil industry in the U.S.
So, what to do? Resort to living in huts, cooking over fire pits, and renouncing computers?
That doesn’t sound too good to me…I need my iTunes, and I know you do, too.
Instead, let’s take a step towards a different kind of energy—clean, green energy. Wind power, the most viable source in this area, uses huge windmills to harness the power of wind, generating electricity without mining, drilling, or burning anything. Wind power is also renewable—we’re soon going to run out of oil reserves, but we’ll never run out of wind.
Once, Wesleyan bought 10 percent of its energy from a company that supplied this clean wind energy. When that company went out of business, the administration went back to depending on fossil fuels. Wesleyan uses 26 million kilowatt-hours of energy every year, spending about $2.5 million. Ten percent green energy cost $30,000 a year—a small percentage of that budget for a move that makes a big difference. Other colleges have made similar or larger commitments—Connecticut College, Oberlin, Yale, Middlebury and others have realized the benefits of green energy.
The state of Connecticut and the New England Governors are also pushing green energy, with a pledge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 10 percent of 1990 levels by 2020. If Wesleyan switched to partial green energy, we’d be right in step with efforts throughout the area.
This year, EON (Environmental Organizers Network) is presenting the administration with a pledge to sign, which includes purchasing 20 percent of our energy from green sources (well within our financial capabilities) and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2010 (buying green energy would partially accomplish this). All we need is student support for the issue—we’ve had green energy before, and we can get it back. With a little bit of that activism we’re so famous for, Wes can be clean, green, and feeling good about our electricity.
Leave a Reply