Climate Action Project

Sir Clive the Climate Crusader and the Quest for the Grail of Green Power Presented at Focus the Nation - 1/31/08

On April 6^th, 2007 President Brad Bartel signed the American College and University President’s Climate Commitment pledging that Fort Lewis would develop a plan to achieve climate neutrality.  

Read the press release about the commitment.

Read the feature article in the Durango Herald about how FLC is addressing the climate crisis

The EC’s Climate Action team is working on making Fort Lewis a cool campus through research and education.  On January 31, 2008, we joined over 1,000 high schools and colleges around the country to host Focus the Nation, a national teach-in on the climate crisis.  The day included 22 speakers, presentations, and films, including a special EC theatrical presentation of "Sir Clive the Climate Crusader and the Quest for the Grail of Green Power" in honor of Ye Olde Snowdown (Durango's winter festival).

Over 250 people participated in Focus the Nation events on January 31, 2008

Projects for 2008-09 include:

Completing a greenhouse gas inventory - In the fall of 2007, students from the Climate Action team used the Clean Air-Cool Planet campus calculator to complete Fort Lewis College's first-ever greenhouse gas inventory.  The inventory showed that during the 2006-07 school year, FLC contributed 15,329 equivalent metric tons of CO2 into the atmospher.  See the raw data on the FLC emisions.  The climate action team will update the inventory for the 2008-09 school year.

Green Building – Fort Lewis is in the midst of a building boom, with a student union, biology building, and resident hall all in design or construction.  Our Climate Action Team will build on the success of Student Life Center (which is still the greenest building in Durango) and work to ensure these new buildings are as climate-friendly as possible.  Visit the team's Green Building web page to get all the details.

Renewable Energy – In 2007-08, the Environmental Center worked with the Governor's Energy Office and Colorado State University to collect data on wind speed and power at the Old Fort Lewis campus to see if we’re windy enough to generate our own power.  You can view the data online.  Preliminary analysis suggests that a small wind turbine to power the agriculture station on the campus would have an 8 to 10 year payback period.  For 2008-09 we will investigate the cost and feasibility of using photovoltaic panels and geothermal heat on campus.  Visit our new renewable energy webpage to learn about the economics of green power and renewable energy on college campuses.

Anemometer installation to measure wind speed - November 2007

Sustainable Transit - Want to get people on bikes?  How about riding a gondola?  The Climate Action Team is looking for ways to get people to and from campus without using a car.  In 2007, 15% of campus population filled out the "How Do You Roll?" commuter survey that gave us our first data on transportation habits for campus.

Thanks to Shan Wells, who helped us tell people about what Colorado's pikas are doing about climate change!