EFS Profiles
Sustainability Initiatives
Ramapo College of New Jersey
Mahwah, New Jersey
Purpose: Curriculum Change, Greening the Campus, Institutional Transformation
Please note that the copyright for this profile is retained by the institution.
At Ramapo College, sustainability provides a new context for the traditional discussion of civic responsibility. It serves as a model for how a campus can embrace the goals of ecoliteracy with initiatives such as regional environmental conferences; sustainable communities course work; environmental education training for K-12 teachers; study abroad programs to Costa Rica, Greece and the American West; and an Environmental Assessment course. Ramapo provides a model for colleges and universities nationwide through its use of alternative energy technology, a bike patrol, and the Alternative Energy and Environment Center.
Energy
Ramapo College supplies most of its electrical needs for one of its new dormitories with a natural gas-powered fuel cell. The device can produce electricity at a cost of about 4 cents per kilowatt-hour compared with the 11-cents per-hour-electricity it now purchases from the local utility. Waste heat from the fuel cell is used for heating potable water further reducing the overall energy bill. The device also acts as an "uninterruptible power source" (UPS) for RCNJ's computer and TV facilities, avoiding an estimated $200,000 investment in separate UPSs for the College.
According to RCNJ's Associate Vice-President for Administration and Finance, Richard Roberts, "Ramapo College in involved in a consortium of State agencies that are aggregating their electricity procurement under the newly deregulated market. A portion of the overall system-wide buying is being set-aside for purchasing power from 'green sources.'"
Bike Patrol
Under the leadership of Prof. Cliff Peterson of American and International Studies, Prof. Michael Edelstein of the Institute for Environmental Studies, and Gene Ritchie, Associate Director of Facilities, Ramapo College acquired a group of six mountain bikes in order to establish a bicycle-mounted patrol that would reduce operational costs. Due to reductions in the use of security automobiles, it is estimated that fuel savings alone should exceed $10,000 per year. Reductions in vehicle emissions are also an added benefit.
The bike patrol has had an immediate environmental impact. The officers are averaging 10 miles per day or 50 miles per week. For each mile traveled by security personnel with human power, there is a fossil-fuel mile avoided. It is estimated that every five miles saves one gallon of gas (gas mileage is low for security vehicles because of time spent idling and at low speeds). Not only is there a savings from the reduction in gasoline and motor vehicle costs, there is also an actual reduction in vehicle emissions.
On top of that there is an added advantage: the physical activity required is benefiting bike patrol personnel. Comments from students have been favorable. They describe the bike patrol officers as more approachable than those in other vehicles. In addition, morale has gone up due to better physical fitness and an increase in public contact.
Alternative Energy and Environment Center
In 1975, a group of Ramapo students and faculty set out to build a model for thinking about how humans can live sustainably on this earth. Over the past decades, hundreds of students have had a hand in nurturing and developing the AEEC and thousands have toured and learned there. Collectively, they have created a special place, where the land and human activity are woven together in a different pattern than what we see elsewhere around us. While our normal patterns of land use and production destroy the environment, at the AEEC we catch a glimpse of a different approach to living, one that inspires a sense of purpose, responsibility and hope for the future. It is a model for reflection, understanding and action---personal and collective.
The features of the AEEC include gardens, a renewably-powered water pumping station, a compost facility, a passive solar greenhouse, a composting privy, a solar schoolhouse, and wind powered electric generating station.
The intensive raised-bed gardens, where techniques of organic gardening (without pesticides, fertilizers or powered machines) help students learn about gardening, develop a closer understand of nature interrelationships, and work off the stresses of daily student life.
At the compost facility, students can see where plant wastes and other organic materials decompose to produce a new crop of rich nutrient-rich humus to be placed back into the garden.
Adjacent to the garden is the renewably powered water pumping station. From a well more than 100' under ground, water is pulled upward by either wind or solar power and stored in a cedar cask raised on a platform high enough to allow gravity to feed the water to all corners of the AEEC as it is needed.
The solar greenhouse is the original building on site. The greenhouse faces south, emits sunlight through its angled glazing, and stores much of the resulting heat in its mass to be released against the chill of the night. The resulting temperatures support the growth of food crops year round without the use of any fuel but the sun, although a wood stove provides insurance against a true cold spell. It is here that seedlings are started for the garden. In back, the composting privy collects human wastes without wasting water and the resulting compost is reclaimed as a soil amendment for non-food crops.
Although a modern high efficiency windmill now turns on its tower, the grandfather windmill, a Jacobs Generator still commands the site of the AEEC electric generating station. A veteran of rural electrification from the 1920s and 1930s, before the grid stretched out to the countryside, the Jacobs was pulled from a barn during the energy crises of the 1970s, refurbished, and given a new life at Ramapo.
Also retired is the model community recycling shed, made obsolete by New Jersey decision to require towns to take responsibility for collecting recyclables. Like the rest of the center, the recycling shed was designed and built by students. For more than a decade, it collected a large variety of recyclables, including glass, aluminum, plastics, and even motor oil. Students processed these materials and delivered them to recycling markets, using the funds to underwrite new construction projects for the AEEC.
Oriented toward the south, the solar schoolhouse employs several forms of passive solar energy for space heating, water heating and cooking. Photovoltaic solar/electric units and a small windmill provide electricity for lighting. The classroom space is the nicest learning environment on campus, well lit with natural light. A wood stove provides back up heat.
The Ramapo College Sustainability Center
The Alternative Energy and Environmental Center is about to be replaced with the Ramapo College Sustainability Center Building (RCSCB),
a new building complex highlighting state-of-the-art sustainable energy and environmental technologies. The complex will be used for classroom education and laboratories, as a demonstration facility for sustainable technologies, and for environmental education and outreach. The RCSCB is presently under design development and will incorporate a mix of features such as an energy efficient envelope, passive solar design, photovoltaics, daylighting, efficient lighting, solar greenhouse, wind turbines, and possibly a geothermal system for heating and cooling. Plans for the use of appropriate green materials for construction, reduction of indoor air pollution, and improved waste handling
technolgies are also being developed. Phase I will consist of an initial 2067 ft2 space with two classrooms, meeting room, storage, and toilets. Phase II (an additional 2379 ft2), including administration, offices, greenhouse and amphitheater, will follow. Phase I construction will start in the spring of 2002, and the complex will open in December 2002. The Phase II timetable depends on fundraising and grants.
NJHEPS
Tour
of the Alternative Energy and Environment Center
Bike
Patrol
Contacts:
Bill Makofske, bmakofsk@ramapo.edu (for information on the AEEC)
James Quigley, (201)684-7031, jquigley@ramapo.edu (for more information
on the Bike Patrol)
This document was last modified on 02/20/2002 10:43:03 AM
© 2005 Second Nature, Inc.
