Sustainable Design

In 2000, the College created a standing committee, the Environmental Advisory Committee, to advise the College on environmental issues. The committee includes three students, three faculty members, and three staff members who meet bi-weekly to discuss and recommend environmental actions that the College should discuss and act on. The following issues have been recommended for consideration and action.

Approved by the Environmental Advisory Committee, 12 April 2001
Endorsed by Board of Trustees, Buildings and Grounds Committee, 18 May 2001

Carleton College recognizes that it exists as part of interconnected communities that are affected by personal and institutional choices. We are dedicated, therefore, to investigating and promoting awareness of the current and future impact of our actions in order to foster responsibility for these human and natural communities. Carleton strives to be a model of environmental stewardship by incorporating ideals of sustainability into the operations of the College and the daily life of individuals.”

The College is pursuing an opportunity to create a series of different living environments that would create different environmental footprints. One option would be the standard single-family two-story house built in 1919.

A second option would be the conversion of the standard single-family two-story house built in 1919, incorporating sustainable measures without significantly destroying the integrity of the house. Following this philosophy, most of these measures would be addendums or retrofits to the existing house such as solar panels, sustainable interior finishes, additional insulation, and new energy efficient windows. This experiment would not be unlike the retrofitting of an average house in a small town throughout America.

A third option would be the design, development, and construction of a living environment that would take sustainable measures to a higher degree. All the measures would be incorporated into the construction and structure of the house.

The final product would be a unique expression of how the students of Carleton are willing to live. Each house will be sited in the same location and be benchmarked on its respective environmental footprint. The students will be aware of the impacts of their living styles in the different structures. Perhaps in the future, the houses can compete with each other to reduce their relative footprint.

The College has adopted the Minnesota Sustainable Design Guide for all new and renovated projects on the campus. The Minnesota Sustainable Design Guide is a tool for learning about sustainability, managing design decisions, and integrating sustainable design into the building design and operation processes for new and renovated facilities. It can be used to define sustainable design priorities and goals; develop appropriate sustainable design strategies; and to determine performance standards to guide the design and decision-making process. It is also a management tool to organize and structure environmental thinking during the design, construction, and operations phases. Although the Design Guide builds on other rating systems, including LEED, Green Building Challenge ’98, and BREEAM, it is unique in providing ecological resources and a step-by-step process to implement sustainable design practices.

The Design Guide provides approximately 50 strategies that are organized according to six environmental design topics—site, water, energy, indoor environment, materials, and waste. Each topic contains a series of design strategies that address the related sustainable design issues. In addition, each strategy has performance indicators, which set the benchmarks that must be obtained in order to gain credit for the strategy. The guide also contains a scoring system that enables the design team and building operators to evaluate building performance. Each strategy is awarded points based on specific performance indicators. One hundred points are distributed among the strategies according to the perceived environmental and human impacts as well as priorities of the Minnesota region. Since some strategies apply only to certain projects (i.e. renovations versus new construction, urban versus rural sites, etc.), the scoring system can be tailored to reflect the opportunities and constraints of the project. The system is designed to be used on Web sites accessible to agency staff and architectural consultants, or as software distributed to project teams.

In 1997, leaders and staff from Hennepin County, the largest county government in Minnesota, designed a program to ensure that new construction and renovations for the county addressed issues of sustainable design. Working with a multi-disciplinary team, Hennepin County set out to develop a sustainable design guide to inform architectural design and building operations.

The first phase of the project (completed in December 1998) involved development of the structure and content for the Minnesota Sustainable Design Guide.

The second phase of the project (which is ongoing) involves the development of resource materials and an educational program to assist designers in the implementation of the system.

The Design Guide has been pilot-tested on projects for Hennepin County and the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. In addition, the guide is currently being applied to projects for Ramsey and Carver counties.

Training and educational programs were conducted in 2000. This project has been developed with the support of the Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance, Hennepin County, and the University of Minnesota Sustainable Design Institute.

• During the design and construction of Carleton’s Student Housing project in 2001 the following sustainable objectives were attained:
  1. All plants used in the landscaping were native to the environment that is defined within 20 miles of the campus,
  2. all showerheads are low flow with the feature to turn off and on while maintaining the same water temperature,
  3. all appliances are Energy Star rated,
  4. Linoleum was used instead of vinyl tile,
  5. the exterior siding is Hardi Board, a cermetious material that has a long durable life, and
  6. a significant portion of the construction materials were recycled off site.

• During the design and construction of the Academic and Dining project in 2001 the following sustainable objectives were attained:
  1. All plants used in the landscaping were native to the environment that is defined within 20 miles of the campus,
  2. a program called Energy Assets was used to optimize the building thermal performance. Weidt Group of Minneapolis, a pre-eminent energy consultant, assisted the College with this DOE-2 analysis and evaluation of energy saving options,
  3. clerestory windows and light shelf were integrated into the design of the building to both reduce the amount of artificial light used and to project natural light further into the interior of the building,
  4. light sensors were employed in the classrooms to dim artificial lights in accordance with the intensity of the daylight,
  5. all the carpeting in the building is 100 percent recycled carpeting,
  6. all interior stone in the building was quarried in Minnesota,
  7. all heavy use floor surfaces are either linoleum or terrazzo, and
  8. a significant portion of the construction materials were recycled off site.

Since 1995, the College has aggressively pursued energy conservation measures such as conversion to T-8 bulbs and electronic ballasts, variable frequency drives (VFD), replacing small horsepower motors, and installing a Building Automation System on most HAVC equipment, etc.

In an effort to use green energy, the College is collaborating with the Northfield School District in the development of wind power in the community. The consortium hopes it will be able to develop two 1.5 megawatt wind turbines close to the community by the end of 2003. One 1.5 megawatt turbine will supply 100 percent of the energy for the Northfield school district and the other will supply 40 percent of the electrical energy needs of Carleton College.

A student formed environmental group, Student Organization for Protecting the Environment (SOPE), has assisted students with composting food waste.

Over 300 students live in college-owned off-campus housing with kitchen facilities. SOPE developed and organized the effort to funnel all food waste from the off-campus housing into area composting barrels.

SOPE provided environmental degradable bags and airtight containers for each of the individual houses to store the food waste for about a week. The students then place these composting bags into neighborhood barrels. These barrels are then emptied by college grounds staff and brought to a central campus composting location.

Once the composting cycle is completed, the college grounds crew recycles the compost into flower beds on campus or the student organic garden groups use the soil for organic gardens.

Along with the normal recycling of white and colored paper that has been common on campus for years, a tree-free student organization asked the College to use only recycled paper for all paper uses. It was the intent of the student group to entice the College into using 100 percent recycled papers. However, the fully recycled paper jammed in the copier machines and the computer printers. As a compromise, the College selected 60 percent recycled content paper for the interim until the older printers and copiers could be retired.

In the past year, the College has implemented three different sustainable solutions to provide initial cleaning of storm water run-off from parking lots.

The first example was expansion of an existing parking area where a vegetated swale was installed to filter storm water before it enters the storm system. The swale was planted with Big Bluestem, a native prairie grass that is tolerant of moist conditions and creates a dense mass of roots and foliage. In addition to providing a primary filtering for storm run-off, the planting will screen the view of the parking, and provide a vegetative connection on campus to the native plantings in the Arboretum and the adjacent creek corridor. The monoculture planting was selected to provide a dramatic aesthetic statement throughout the year.

The second example was the construction of another new parking lot where a vegetative swale is utilized to filter storm water prior to draining into a detention pond. The parking lot is adjacent to the Cannon River, so the double filtering is important due to the proximity to this protected natural feature.

And thirdly, at the Arboretum Office, a small experimental gravel parking lot was constructed. Matting composed of a plastic matrix provides stability and keeps the gravel in place. The gravel and the permeable base material allow storm water to percolate into the ground rather than surface drain. If this treatment is successful, additional lots will be constructed with this system in the future.

Last fall, the Facilities Maintenance Office at Carleton began using a flat finish recycled paint made up of recycled latex. The recycled paint is being used in campus residential housing units, and when an eggshell paint is available it will be used in high traffic areas.

Amazon Environmental, Inc. (AEI) located in Roseville, Minnesota, remanufactures the paint. AEI is a leading provider of latex paint recycling services. Their latex paint recycling facility accepts all types of water-based paint waste. The reusable quality materials are then manufactured into high quality paints for consumer and commercial use.

The primary method used to ensure a high quality recycled paint product is the careful sorting of individual containers. Each container is opened and inspected to determine if the paint is usable. Typically only 50% of the paint received at their facility meets the criteria for paint re-use.

Using recycled paint not only provides a market for a former waste stream, but saves money. Each can of paint is between 50%-70% less expensive than the virgin product.

Environmental/Sustainability Walk for Carleton College. Where do we want to go?

Purpose

According to a recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), humanity’s use of natural resources, or its ‘Ecological Footprint,’ has exceeded the regenerative capacity of the Earth since the 1980s… human demand in 1961 was about 70 percent of the Earth’s regenerative capacity. By the 1980s, demand had risen to match total global supply, and by 1999 demand exceeded supply by at least twenty percent. It takes the biosphere, therefore, at least a year and three months to renew what humanity uses in a single year

With this mind, the College desires to become a more environmentally sustainable community/campus. The College is seeking coherences between its environmental vision and its present state of sustainability.

Carleton College is a small liberal arts college located on the edge of a small rural town. Physically, the College is intimately linked with the town’s infrastructure and the rural landscape. Each of these connections shape and determine the College’s ecological footprint.

With the realization that sustainability occurs on many different levels, commitments from all sectors of the college community will be required. However, before we can start our journey, we must know the road, the destination and who is coming with us. We will have to develop a vision of where we would like to go and what it will look like when we get there. Then we will have to construct a plan to guide us on the walk.

Date Line: 1 October 2003

In the summer of 2002, Northfield School District initiated a meeting with St. Olaf College, the City of Northfield, Northfield ReNew (a community based wind advocacy organization) and Carleton College to create a taskforce to explore the opportunity of developing wind energy. After the exploration of sites adjacent to the community, two ridges were found to be candidate for wind power. Only the school district and Carleton College were interested in further developing a feasibility study to determine the costs, location, and public acceptance of two industrial size wind turbines. An anemometer was erected on each of the ridges to determine the amount of wind and which turbine would produce the most power for the sites. Jointly Carleton and the school district hired a wind developer to assist in the development of the project.

Early in the exploration, a public meeting sponsored by Northfield ReNew was held. At the meeting, the public was told of the two sites and the School District’s and Carleton College’s desire to develop wind turbines. Over 90 community members attended the meeting curious about the projects. Except for a few who were worried about bird kills, the initial acceptance of the idea was universal. About 9 months later, a public pooling firm in conjunction with a school referendum, asked citizens about wind power. The survey indicated that there was a high acceptance of the school district developing wind power – 80 % are in favor if it makes money.

After a substantial amount of wind data was collected, a formal bidding process was conducted for the best turbine. Because of the slightly slower wind speed than in western Minnesota, a Micro 1.65 MW turbine with 82 meter blades was selected and used for the cost estimate and creation of a development scenario.

As we proceed into the 22nd Century, our consumption rates require that we will need three additional plants in order to maintain our life styles.

“According to a recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), humanity’s use of natural resources, or its “Ecological Footprint,” has exceeded the regenerative capacity of the Earth since the 1980s…….human demand in 1961 was about 70 percent of the Earth’s regenerative capacity. By the 1980s demand had risen to match total global supply, and by 1999 demand exceeded supply by at least twenty percent. It takes the biosphere, therefore, at least a year and three months to renew what humanity uses in a single year.”

With this in mind, the College desires to become a more environmentally sustainable community/campus. The College is seeking coherences between its environmental vision and its present state of sustainability. Carleton College is a small liberal arts college located on the edge of a small rural town. Physically, the college is intimately linked with the small town’s infrastructure and the rural landscape. Each of these connections shape and determine the college’s ecological footprint. With the realization that sustainability occurs on many different levels, and every available resource will be required.

“Carleton College recognizes that it exists as part of interconnected communities that are affected by personal and institutional choices. We are dedicated, therefore, to investigating and promoting awareness of the current and future impact of our actions in order to foster responsibility for these human and natural communities. Carleton strives to be a model of environmental stewardship by incorporating ideals of sustainability into the operations of the college and the daily life of individuals.”

Approved by the Environmental Advisory Committee 12 April 2001
Endorsed by Board of Trustees Buildings and Grounds Committee 18 May 2001

The mid-continent portion of the United States is blessed with an abundance of wind resources. Since 1981, 4,250 megawatts of wind energy has been developed in the U.S. Since the mid 1990’s, utilities and farmers in southwestern Minnesota have mined this wind resource producing 336 megawatts. Another 259 megawatts is anticipated to be installed in the next years. Xcel is producing over 308 Megawatts of electricity or almost 3.75 percent of Xcel’s energy portfolio. Two technological factors have changed in the last 10 years that allows the area around Northfield to be a fertile wind resource. The design of the industrial grade wind turbines has progressed to a point where they can capture energy at a lower wind speed. Although the winds around Northfield are not as strong as in the southwestern portion of Minnesota, with the new technologies, turbines have become economically feasible. The second factor is linked to the first. With the development of the wind resource, not only have the turbines become more efficient, but turbines have shared in some economies of scale and therefore are cheaper. In 1980, a wind-generated kilowatt-hour cost almost 40 cents to produce. Currently the same kilowatt-hour costs about 4 cents to produce.

This wind turbine development presents the College with incredible educational, environmental, and economic opportunities.

With each of the turbines there is a computer interface. The data relayed to the computer tracks and displays the wind speeds at each moment, the amount of energy being generated, and the capacity of the turbine. The physics department can study the mechanical aspects of the turbine and the generation of energy with the power of the wind. The kilowatt-hours can be instantaneously translated into reduction of greenhouse gases. These emissions can be tracked and accumulated over time. There could be a learning station set up in the physics department gathering space where students can access data generated by the turbine as well as information about how the turbine works and why wind power is important to Carleton and the region. There could be a tutorial about green energy and the efficiency of the very methods of green energy. Each type could be compared and contrasted as to their effectiveness and environmental footprint.

In the United States, approximately 6.6 tons (almost 15,000 pounds carbon equivalent) of greenhouse gases are emitted per person every year. And emissions per person have increased about 3.4% between 1990 and 1997. Most of these emissions, about 82%, are from burning fossil fuels to generate electricity and power cars.

Carleton’s environmental impacts are as follows: One 1.65 megawatt turbine would replace about 40% of our total electrical load with green non-polluting energy. A 1.65 megawatt turbine would reduce noxious emission of greenhouse gases in the amount of: CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) – 4,318.1(tons), VOCs (Volatile Organic Compounds) – 170.8 (lbs), NOx (Nitrous Oxide) – 11.6 (tons), CO (Carbon Monoxide) – 1,665.8 (lbs), SO2 (Sulfur Dioxide) – 11.5(tons), PM10 – 1,223.9 (lbs), and Mercury – 0.1 (lbs). The Danish study for the Ministry of the Environment also estimated that a coal-fired power plant emits 360 times more SOx, NOx, and carbon dioxide to generate an equivalent amount of electricity over the 25-year life of a wind turbine. So we could estimate over the life of Carleton’s turbine, we would reduce CO2 by 1.5 million tons.

The development and construction of a 1.65 Megawatt wind turbine located approximately 1-1/2 miles east of Carleton College in cooperation with the Northfield School District. This wind turbine will be a utility grade wind turbine and will be approximately 360 feet in height with blades approximately 82 feet in length. The turbines will be connected to an Xcel distribution line. Xcel is willing to buy the produced energy for .033 cent per Kilowatt-hour for all energy produced. This energy price can be contracted at a fixed rate for 20 years. The College will have to pay for the cost of the turbine, land lease, transmission lines to the distribution line, interconnection equipment, transformers, property, and business interruption insurance, taxes, and maintenance. The estimated kilowatt-hour per annum of a 1.65 Megawatt turbine is approximately 5,000,000 KWH.

In addition to Xcel’s energy payment, the college qualifies for a Minnesota Production Credit of .015 cents per kilowatt-hour for a ten-year period.

Another source of funding is the Federal Production Credit. This is an alternative for the Federal Tax Credit for non-profits. The production credit is approximately .018 per kilowatt-hour for 10 years. There is no limit to the amount of funding for the credit but the government is not required to reimburse the applicant fully. To date, all applicants have been fully funded. This credit is funded annually.

The costs (capital, operational, and debt reduction) for the wind turbine are estimated as follows:

Sale of Energy from the Turbine (5,000,000 KWh @ .033 cent/KHh) $185,351
Annual Expense $50,000
Loan Repayment (1.5 million @ 6%) $141,589
Annual Profit/Loss -$6,238
10 year State Production Credit (5,000,000 KWh @ .015 cent/KHh) $81,773
10 year Federal Production Credit (5,000,000 KWh @ .018 cent/KHh)

Construction Cost $1,500,000

20 year average profit/loss $692,965

Construction Cost $1,500,000

Sale of Energy from the Turbine (5,000,000 KWh @ .033 cent/KHh) $185,351
Annual Expense $50,001
Loan Repayment (1.5 million @ 5%) $120,363
Annual Profit/Loss $14,987
10 year State Production Credit (5,000,000 KWh @ .015 cent/KHh) $81,773
10 year Federal Production Credit (5,000,000 KWh @ .018 cent/KHh) $90,000

20 year average profit/loss $2,009,740

Current schedule for the project:
Sep-Nov Develop a Memorandum of Understanding with the School District
Nov-Jan Develop the Ballot for the School District voters
Dec 04 Apply for Federal Production Credits
Jan 04 School District vote on the Wind Energy Issue
Feb 04 Develop and Distribute a bid document for a wind turbine
Feb 04 Apply for Condition Use Permit from Rice County
Mar 04 Select a wind turbine and place order for 2-wind turbines
Aug 04 Turbine delivery and installation
Sept 04 Green Energy Production