Greening Academia

Back in June of this year 70 college presidents gathered in Washington and signed a pledge to make their campuses “carbon neutral” as soon as possible. In effect they were saying that their schools would have zero impact on the earth’s atmosphere.

While the vision of a “carbon neutral” setting in academia helps place the schools on the cutting edge of the green movement and even though another 378 schools have signed on to the pledge many of the signatories are finding tougher to walk the walk than talk the talk on this issue.

As many schools have rushed to purchase green energy, they do so at a cost. Because renewable energy produced by wind or hydro-power is sent to the electricity grid and mixed with standard energy the wind generated electrons are indistinguishable from the coal, oil or other sources they actually don’t buy green energy. Instead they buy the same energy everyone else does but pay a premium for renewable energy credits (REC) in an effort to provide utilities with an incentive to build more green-power facilities.

So while the colleges and universities may feel good about their efforts they take on the uncertainty of the value of the REC’s that they have purchased much like the dubious “carbon credits” that is so much in vogue in Hollywood and other places.

Not all college presidents are on board though. David Oxtoby who heads the liberal Pomona College recently told the Chronicle of Higher Education that he feels that carbon neutrality is a myth and that colleges can’t erase their climate impact without taking unreasonable steps and yet he signed the pledge. He won’t be on Al Gore’s Christmas card list for sure.

At least four institutions have decided not to sign the pledge for various reasons, Colorado College, Reed College, the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities and Willams College. The schools are already taking steps to reduce emissions and all face particular challenges to try and go “carbon neutral” not the least of these is the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities which has 70% of its power supplied by coal. The cost of retrofitting the university to go green would be substantial and the economic payoff uncertain at best.

As is par for the course with many environmental initiatives the supposed benefits are played up while the costs, impact and reality are largely ignored since anything that is green is good trumps reason in this world. And if there is any group that is more out of touch with reality it would be college and university presidents who can just pass along the extra costs to the students in the name of being green, while continuing to collect plenty of it for themselves.

If they really wanted to reduce their impact on the environment then maybe they could shut down their school and turn it into a park.

Don Irvine is the chairman of both Accuracy in Media and Accuracy in Academia.