Newsletter November, 2004

In this issue:

• Upcoming NJHEPS Energy Workshop (December 3, Brookdale Community College): Strategies for Energy Effectiveness
• NJHEPS Workshop Features New Green Design Guidelines--- and the Design Process
• December 14: New Jersey Sustainable State Institute Launch Party for Living With the Future in Mind III
• Faculty Profile: Dr. Reginald Luke, Middlesex County College
• At Rutgers' Cook College, Student-Run Organic Garden Feeds a Hundred NJ Neighbors
• NJIT Brings Photovoltaics and a Green Roof to Campus
• New Jersey Leads Nation in Reducing Mercury and Arsenic Levels
• Campus Sustainability: November Short Takes
  • Campus sustainability students listserv
  • NWF Campus Ecology grants due Dec. 15
  • Harvard Makes Major Green Power Purchase
  • Ithaca College: Model Sustainability Initiatives
• Education for Sustainability: Resources and Opportunities
• Upcoming Events
  • Conference: Technology and Human Becoming (December 4, DeVry Institute, North Brunswick NJ)
  • Upcoming AEE Telecourses.

Upcoming NJHEPS Energy Workshop: Strategies for Energy Effectiveness Dec. 3, Brookdale Community College

NJHEPS presents a Fall Energy Workshop: Optimizing Energy Performance & Funding Opportunities, Friday, December 3, 8:30 AM - 3:30 PM, at Brookdale Community College(Lincroft, New Jersey). The workshop will focus on the BPU and other funders, new energy technologies (including energy management systems), and the opportunities present in LEED for Existing Buildings (LEED-EB).

Special Feature: Gerald Portee will present Energy Progress, Energy Plans (PowerPoint presentation), a report on UMDNJ's energy achievements and projects.

Agenda is as follows:

8:30 - 9:00 Welcome from Dr. Donald Wheeler and Breakfast
9:00 - 9:30 Dr. Richard Dunk - Rutgers University, Wind Power Project
9:30 - 10:00 BPU - grant and funding opportunities
10:00 - 10:30 Lisa Westerfield - USGBC, Nuts and Bolts of LEED EB
10:30 - 11:00 Dr. Lynn Stiles - Richard Stockton College of New Jersey, Aquifer Thermal Storage and Implementing New Technologies at Stockton
11:00 - 11:30 World Energy Alternatives - Bob Gray, World Energy and representatives from Medford Township, NJ
11:30 - 12:15 Gerald Portee - UMDNJ, Energy Progress, Energy Plans at UMDNJ
12:15 - 1:00 Lunch
1:00 - 1:30 Lori Winyard - The College of New Jersey, How to Run Your Campus with Optimal Efficiency
1:30 - 2:00 David Ellis - Enerwise, Submetering, Load Shedding, and Peak Demand Days
2:00 - 2:30 Carole Trabachino - Johnson Controls, Energy Management Systems
2:30 - 3:00 Charlie Wise - Verdiem, Computer Based Energy Management Software
3:00 - 3:30 IceTec Energy Management Systems
3:30 Concluding Discussion and Refreshments

The Workshop will be held in the Navasink Room, located in the Student Life Center. Please see the Brookdale Web Site for directions.

Questions/Suggestions? Contact Terra Meierdierck (tmeierdierck@njheps.org; 973/642-7848).

Please register for this FREE event through acteva.com.

Ocean County College's Model High-Performance Technology Building

NJHEPS Workshop Features New Green Design Guidelines --- and the Design Process *Powerpoint presentations attached

Eduardo Del Valle*, Associate Vice-President of Facilities and Campus Planning, began by describing how to incorporate green building standards in Campus Master Plans. Mr. Del Valle stressed that campus planners “should build only what is needed,” adding that university buildings constructed with excess space standards are not sustainable. Rutgers University Exec Dir. for Facilities Project Administration, Gina Bleck explained how sustainable design standards could be integrated into the RFQ’s and RFP’s of a particular project thereby ensuring that sustainable building principles are incorporated into construction. Montclair University Project Manager for Architectural and Engineering Services, Walter Kanzler* described how using a “holistic design approach” to building design was successful in the design and construction of the campus’s New Academic Building which is registered for LEED certification. .

A tour of the new Ocean County College Technology Center, registered for LEED Silver, was led by Tom Fantacone* and associates from RJF Fletcher Thompson Architects that designed the firm and Ken Olson, OCC Director of Facilities. A lunchtime panel invited an in-depth discussion about how high-performance buildings, once built, can maintain their environmental attributes over their lifespan.

NJHEPS rolled out draft portions of their publication, High Performance Campus Design Handbook,Vol..2, Green Design Guidelines, in the afternoon session. Bill Bobenhausen, President of the Sustainable Design Collaborative, presented a detailed description of the construction materials section of the Guidelines. Mike Kornitas, Senior Design Planner Estimator at Rutgers, presented the HVAC components of the design guidelines, including HVAC materials, installation, and maintenance. The Guidelines follow the outline of the Construction Specification Institute (CSI). They offer sustainable construction options for the consideration of design professionals and facilities staff.

Several participants stated that the Guidelines would be very useful in their work. The Guidelines will be presented to the New Jersey Presidents’ Council and the Commission on Higher Education for their support.

Divisions 14, 15, 16, and 17 for review.

December 14: New Jersey Sustainable State Institute Launch Party for Living With the Future in Mind III

Where are we, and where are we heading? Are the economic, social, and environmental underpinnings of New Jersey's prosperity sustainable? The mission of the Sustainable State Institute is to provide answers to these questions. Living With the Future in Mind III continues our mission by reporting on the major goals for the future of New Jersey and provides real data on the trends most important to our lives and to the sustainability of our State.

The symposium features notable speakers from government, academia and the non-profit sector. The formal event will be followed by a reception to discuss the future of New Jersey and the Sustainable State Institute.

Location: The Bloustein School Special Events Forum, Civic Square Building, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey.

For more information or to RSVP, please contact NJSSI at 73/932.5680 x 695, or email Randalls@eden.rutgers.edu.

AROUND THE CAMPUSES

Dr. Reggie Luke

Faculty Profile: Dr. Reginald Luke

Dean of Science, Mathematics and Health Technologies
Middlesex County College
732/906.2533
Reggieluke@aol.com

Dr. Luke's first teaching position was in mathematics at Middlesex County College. Dr. Luke has remained there for over 33 years, where he presently is Professor of Mathematics and the Dean for Science, Mathematics and Health Technologies. Previously, he served as the Mathematics Department Chair for 10 years. But Dr. Luke's interest and experiences extend beyond the mathematics and science spheres. Notably, Dr. Luke was selected to became one of several Ramapo Scholars in a FIPSE grant secured by Ramapo College to promote global studies in the undergraduate curriculum. Dr. Luke's project paper focused on the dynamics of world population growth and the differing perspectives on the population crises by economists and biologists. Involvement in this FIPSE project set the stage for Dr. Luke's participation in the NJ Higher Education Partnership in Sustainability (NJHEPS).

Dr. Luke's role in NJHEPS has been to chair the Education Sustainability Committee over the past several years and to suggest ways that the organization can promote sustainability within the undergraduate curriculum. A significant step was achieved this year when the group's proposal for a National Science Foundation grant was reviewed and approved. This project will produce 4 modules that explore local sustainability issues with "Webquest" pedagogy: scenarios that use role-playing to engagingly and fully explore an issue from various perspectives. Students will have to grapple with the same issues that educators, politicians, the media, and concerned citizens have had to confront very recently in planning a viable future for residents of the state. Students will have to research and develop collaborative solutions to these impending and imposing critical issues, realizing that they and the next generations to come will have to live with the environment that their decisions create.

We thank Dr Luke for all his hard work, and look forward to his continued contributions.

The Cook College Student Organic Farm is the nation's largest organic farm managed by university students. Founded in 1993, the farm is operated as a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) project. Families and households invest in the farming skills of Cook College students, in return for a weekly share of organically-grown food.

The farm provides students with paid summer internships and an educational experience difficult to find elsewhere in the country: hands-on experience in the production and management of a small organic farm enterprise. The students cultivate and maintain three acres of land on the Cook College campus, providing food for the CSA's "shareholders" and generating cash for the college -- this year generating $35,000 in gross receipts from CSA subscribers.. Students manage all aspects of the CSA, and coordinate donations and deliveries of surplus produce with Elijah's Promise Soup Kitchen in New Brunswick.

This program is part of the New Jersey Urban Ecology Program which seeks to ensure that all New Jersey communities are food secure. NJUEP also operates the Youth Farmstand Project, which provides at-risk youth with job training through the entrepreneurial experience of owning and operating a summer Farmstand business.

New Jersey Leads Nation in Reducing Mercury and Arsenic Levels

"If New Jersey's mercury rules were enacted nationally, annual emissions from coal-fired power plants alone would decline from approximately 48 tons to about five tons," said Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Commissioner Bradley Campbell, announcing the new standards. "At the same time," he said, "through existing technologies we can provide greater health protections, reducing the risk of cancers from arsenic in drinking water."

The regulations call for a 90 percent reduction of mercury emissions from the state's 10 coal-fired boilers in power plants by the end of 2007. The rules allow for some flexibility, giving plants the option of meeting the standards in 2012 if they also make major reductions in their emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and fine particulates. Emissions from iron and steel smelters, municipal solid waste incinerators, and medical waste incinerators also will be sharply curtailed through ambitious timetables for significant reductions.

The new arsenic rules establish a maximum contaminant level of five parts per billion (ppb) for arsenic concentrations in drinking water, effective January 23, 2006. In February 2002, the federal government adopted a 10-ppb arsenic drinking water standard, also effective January 23, 2006. No state other than New Jersey has adopted an arsenic standard as protective as five ppb. Long-term exposure to arsenic through drinking water can cause cancer of the skin, lungs and bladder. As arsenic is a naturally occurring element found throughout New Jersey, it is important for water purveyors to take active steps to reduce arsenic levels in drinking water, Campbell said.

Exposure to a toxic form of mercury comes primarily from eating contaminated fish and shellfish. Children and pregnant women are especially susceptible to mercury contamination. Even exposure to low levels can potentially cause permanent brain damage to the fetus, infants, and young children. Scientists estimate up to 60,000 children may be born annually in the United States at elevated risk for neurological problems leading to poor school performance because of mercury exposure while in utero. Mercury can contaminate waterbodies either directly through runoff or from air pollution that deposits in the water. Once in an aquatic ecosystem, it accumulates in the tissues of animals as methylmercury, a toxic and harmful form of mercury. Studies have shown that reducing mercury emissions can reduce contamination in nearby ecosystems. In Florida, scientists found that mercury concentrations in fish and wading birds in the Everglades have declined by 60 to 70 percent in the last 10 years as a result of controls in mercury emissions in neighboring industries.

The adopted rules will appear in the December 6, 2004 New Jersey Register. For further information: www.alternet.org/envirohealth/20440/.

Campus Sustainability: November Short Takes