Environmental Action Organization

Local offsets have been identified as the preferred way for St. Lawrence to mitigate emissions unable to be avoided in other ways. Doing simple weatherization/energy efficiency retrofits on the homes of our least fortunate North Country Residents would allow St. Lawrence to claim the greenhouse gas emission savings while providing a social benefit. Local politics surrounding federal funding and the weatherization efforts of the Community Development Program (CDP) as well as an unclear relationship with the local nonprofit Community Energy Services has led to little movement forward on this effort by the administration. However, students want to get out in the community and given CDPs lack of interest in accepting and training student volunteers, a community member is planning a few hour training on simple weatherization/energy efficiency retrofits after which students intend on advertizing in the community as an independent group offering this service. The training has yet to be scheduled and the scope and funding of the project yet to be defined.

Short term goals: train a handful of students and make improvements in at least three North Country homes
Long term goals: develop a local offset program that includes the participation of students and other SLU community members

Oberlin College has been the envy of many University’s energy managers, sustainability coordinators, students and professors for years. Their Lucid Design’s energy monitoring dashboard allows building residents to see their energy use in real time. Discussions about how to make this project a reality at St. Lawrence began in 2006. Cost has been the largest inhibitor for SLU to have our own real time data displays. The largest problem is the lack of sub-metering on campus. All of our on campus building’s electricity use is on one of three meters, allowing for little to no clues about building use or efficiency. While many in the administration, staff, faculty and student body believe there will be significant benefits from the installation of such a system, the cost of putting a meter on each building is NOT insignificant. Meters are only one part of the system needed to make a dashboard such as Oberlin’s a reality, and in the current economic climate there is no guarantee we can find money for the additional infrastructure this project needs.

Short term goal: data analysis of cost and savings of metering only electricity in dorms
Long term goal: individual meters and real time display of electricity, heat and water for all buildings allowing for resource reduction focused behavior campaigns, better functioning of building systems and alerts to problems and opportunities for academic projects

Project Documents: 

St. Lawrence Universiy Proposal .pdf