Growing Green
Harvard aims to help save the planet
by Nell Porter Brown
In an unprecedented move that raised the bar for environmental standards, University leaders in September agreed to cut the greenhouse gases emitted by new buildings on the Allston campus to between 30 and 50 percent below the levels required by national standards. Initial focus would be on the four-building Harvard Allston Science Complex—a 530,000-square-foot structure that includes ground-level retail space and a central yard that echoes the quads of the Cambridge campus.
Photograph by John Chase / Harvard News Office
Shuttle buses are powered by biofuel and are equipped with easy-access bicycle racks.
Although the agreement is related to fledgling state policies aimed at reducing emissions from large-scale real-estate development projects, it is also the latest sign of Harvard’s long-term commitment to responsible growth. According to Christopher M. Gordon, chief operating officer of the Allston project, “Harvard’s Allston campus ultimately will be the University’s greatest expression of environmental sustainability.”
Michael Guarino and Sandy Lacey / Harvard University Planning Office
An overview of Harvard's LEED structures.
Within the last decade, the University has steadily built on a series of “sustainability principles” (www.greencampus.harvard.edu/about/principles.php) that dictate sweeping changes aimed at reducing waste and conserving energy across all of its campuses and schools. The Harvard Green Campus Initiative (HGCI)—www.greencampus.harvard.edu—was funded in 2000 to implement those principles. The office now has 20 full-time professional staff members and 40 student employees working with many Harvard schools and service groups on a diverse set of projects, such as operating buses that run on a mix of diesel fuel and soy oil; running a pilot kitchen project where food waste is reconstituted as fertilizer and cooking oils are recycled; using stored rainwater to clean University vehicles; and ramping up the recycling of school supplies and dormitory furnishings.
“The biggest challenge is coordinating such a wide range of stakeholders and efforts, so that we make the most of every opportunity to share lessons learned; leverage successes to expand commitments; and generally make sure that we are being strategic with the way in which we are greening this enormous, decentralized organization,” says HGCI director Leith Sharp, an environmental engineer and educator. “Harvard is known to have the most extensive green-campus initiative of any university in the country.”
HGCI, for example, facilitates the certification process of the 26 buildings (new or retrofitted) at the University that have been or will be submitted for consideration as LEED structures. (LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, is a series of standards for sustainable structures set by the U.S. Green Building Council, a nonprofit building-industry consortium.)
1 | 2 | continued >
