DEL.ICIO.USQ&A: Agnes Scott’s director of sustainability
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Can locally grown carrots, hybrid cars and turning off fluorescent lights really save the planet? All of this will likely come up during the Georgia Organics Conference this week on the campus of Agnes Scott College in Decatur.
Courtesy of Agnes Scott
Susan Kidd, director of sustainability for Agnes Scott College.
But after all of the marquee foodies and farmers pack up their canvas bags and leave, Susan Kidd, director of sustainability for Agnes Scott, will still be there trying to figure out how to make the tiny Decatur college a model of minimal C02 emissions and high-energy efficiency. Here Kidd talks about the quest to get green and how carrying your own recycling can be a fantastic upper body workout.
Q: So how green are you in your life?
A: I drive a Prius, but I waited until I actually needed a new car. The building I live in didn’t have recycling, and I live on the third floor. So for 10 years I carried my recycling down the stairs and to a recycling center. I try to purchase as much local and organic food as possible. But I love to travel, and so that’s where my [carbon] footprint veers off: air travel.
Q: What exactly does a “director of sustainability” do? Is that simply a fancy title to get grant money?
A: [Laughs] The title and the task of the position represents Agnes Scott’s commitment to being climate-neutral. We’re really trying to get people to think about making different choices. The best way to save money, from a budget perspective, is if you get people to turn off, print less, going to temperature settings that are industry standards. From the technical side, we’re changing our energy sources to more renewable sources. Those are time- consuming and expensive.
Q: How do you measure greenhouse gas emissions on a tiny campus in the middle of a metro area that has one of the worst levels of air quality in the country?
A: There’s actually a national calculator created by a class at the University of New Hampshire and a nonprofit organization. It focuses on utility use, electricity and natural gas. When you put in your utility use in the calculator, you have to say what region of the country you’re in. So your utility use is filtered through the source of your electricity, and in the Southeast the majority of that energy comes from coal-fired power plants. The calculator considers that fact. So that causes our emissions level to be even higher than it would be if we were providing our energy through another source. But our footprint, our carbon emissions, are actually smaller than we thought they would be. It’s about 12,600 metric tons of CO2. For schools our size, it’s not the smallest — but it’s actually in the middle to lower range.
Q: So you’ve got your own micro-climate?
A: We’ve nearly 2,000 trees on the campus. One of our neighbors called it her “Central Park.” But there is a big national debate about can you even talk about reducing your own carbon on site in urban areas because there is so much [pollution] pressing in on you. There is no bubble over Agnes Scott.
Q: What do you think about people who deny climate change or who say the evidence of it is shaky?
A: Climate change is real, and it’s one of the most important political issues we’re facing. I believe the research.
Q: Some people say Al Gore, like Satan, is a liar — when it comes to claims of global warming.
A: [Laughs] We’re doing an issue of the alumni magazine that’s going to hit on all these issues, and we’ll get some letters to the editor from some alums that disagree.
Q: Talking about locally grown food is so chichi now. So if the campus is so green, do you have a kitchen garden here?
A: We do not. But we’re planning to grow herbs on campus, and that’s been initiated by our dining staff. But [this week] we’re going to announce a partnership for gardening and food with the city of Decatur, Decatur city schools, Georgia Organics and Oakhurst. What we’re going to do is find multiple locations to [develop] gardens and figure out who does the labor, how it’s funded and how the [produce] is distributed to the community.
Q: What’s the cost of making Agnes Scott climate-neutral?
A: Millions of dollars. The renewable energy side alone, if we were able to replace a portion of our energy with solar and wind, would be several million dollars. The mechanical replacement — lighting retrofit, replacing boilers — that’s about $2.5 million.
Q: Would you rely solely on grants to get there or would you have to raise student fees and tuition?
A: One of our trustees said, “Wouldn’t the most sustainable result of all this be that tuition actually goes down?” It keeps you honest to think that way, that in the purest sense of sustainability that’s what it would mean. Right now, we would not impose any fee or tuition increase related to sustainability, but some large universities are making “green fees.”
Q: Do you really think this program is sustainable and that this isn’t a fad? What’s to say you won’t just run out of money before the campus gets to its goal of neutrality?
A: We’re looking at 20 to 30 years to be climate neutral. That’s a long time. Even with a small footprint.
Services »
