Carbon Commitment Committee

Facilitators: Keith Jayawickrama and Beth Filar Williams (Co-chairs)
Notetaker: Keith Jayawickrama
Voting Members Present: Lindsay Andrews, Lety Cavazos, Ed Dever, Maricruz Gomez, Laurie Houston, Perry Hystad, Keith Jayawickrama, Cinamon Moffett, Jacob Putney, Laura Rees, Andres Schmidt, Drake Scrafford, Shelly Signs, Brandon Trelstad, Jason Weiss, Beth Filar Williams
Voting Members Absent: Chris Anderson, Tess Collins, Grant Jacobsen, Leela Magdaleno, Desiree Tullos, Erika Wolters
Ex-officio Member Present: Scott Elmshaeuser
Guest: John Deuel

Welcome, Brief Self-introductions (<10 minutes)

• In chat while we wait to start >>> Add a word or statement of something you are hopeful for or excited about in the new year.
• Introductions
  • New student member! Drake Scrafford ([email protected])
  • Others?
• Approve November 7, 2022, meeting minutes 
  • Need to add attendees to all notes

Action: Ed moved to approve the November 7 minutes, seconded. The motion passed.

• Announcements/Additions?
  • Quick show of our Box folder, folders, and edit files (Check everyone has access)
• Beth demonstrated the contents of the box folder.

Working group reports (5 min each – links to box folder)

• Communications  
  • Notes are in the Box folder. Carbon offsets. Interested in helping the Fume Hoods campaign. Members – Tess Collins, Jacob Putney, Shelly Signs, Beth Filar Williams
• Education and Curriculum
  • Has not met since the last Committee meeting. Sustainability is to be highlighted in the next Strategic Plan. Members – Lindsay Andrews, Lety Cavazos, Ed Dever, Perry Hystad
• Conservation, Efficiency and Transportation (CET)  
  • Has not met since the last Committee meeting.

Fume Hoods Campaign Update – Brandon Trelstad (5 minutes)

• Currently waiting on a lost shipment of sticker material (Office Depot). Look at the CET Box folder for documentation. “Lower the Sash” campaign. Linus Pauling, Johnson Hall, Cordley West. 100-150 stickers printed for a start. Richardson Hall should be on the list later. Is there an easy way to tell if a hood is constant or variable volume? No. Facilities Services and Environmental Health and Safety are building a database on this.

“Path to Carbon Neutrality (PCTN)” – Brandon Trelstad (10 minutes)

• Progress since November to share?
• Updated greenhouse gas numbers from FY22
  • PTCN was signed in June 2022. Action 8 is on an accelerated timeline. Working on District energy systems, the next at Kelley, to serve Johnson Hall, Kelley and several other buildings. This was helped by the $50 million donation for the Collaborative Innovation Complex (CIC). Within the CIC will be a 2MW supercomputer, which generates a lot of heat, expected to heat at least one more major building in winter. However, in summer they will still be generating heat, and at that time would be electricity used to cool the buildings.
  • Action 3 – Contracts are out for solar installations on 3 buildings – Milam, Beth Ray, and Richardson Hall for around 400,000 KW.
  • Community Solar project at the NWREC Campus in Aurora (“Agrivoltaic Array”). Will be putting electricity into the PGE grid. OSU is eligible to purchase 40% of the electricity at a 5% discount. https://today.oregonstate.edu/news/construction-starts-oregon-state-agrivoltaics-farm-will-merge-agriculture-and-solar-energy
  • Hiring two more people in the building heating and cooling controls in the next month or so. They would be working mostly on Action 1.
  • FY22 Greenhouse Gas total is about 117,000 tons CO₂. Compared to FY19 (138,000 tons) it is a substantial reduction. However, compared to FY21, when a lot of people were working from home, air travel and some other categories went up. Still, 117,000 tons is a long way from carbon neutral.
  • % coal-derived electricity in the Pacific Power grid is going down, now less than 50%
  • EV charging at OSU has been handed off from the Sustainability Office to Transportation Services.
  • Is electricity generated at OSU Energy Center, burning natural gas, cleaner than the electricity from the grid? Yes, still. OSU emissions were listed in a recent Reuters article. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-pollution-universities/

Washington Oregon Higher Education Sustainability Conference (WOHESC) – Beth Filar Williams (5 minutes)

• Reminder: at OSU, March 6-8, 2023, https://wohesc.org
  • Who is planning to attend? (give thumbs up in chat)
  • Brandon is presenting very briefly on the Path, with others Sustainability Roundtable style > encourage you all to attend…
  • How? Conference in person ($149 with at least 3 registered), virtual only ($50), perhaps a few free passes for Committee members who need financial support to attend (Brandon)
  • Student free scholarships to go? – Brandon Trelstad
  • Funding for about 100 student slots. Committee members please spread the word. See if you can help students via carpooling options.

Beavs Trash Building Contest/Idea – Tess Collins, Shelley Signs (5-10 minutes)

• Could this be for earth day? Or winter event?
  • Building a Beaver from recycled materials outside your building? Something on plastic. Might be combined with Earth Week. John Deuel was in support. “Landfill on the lawn” (Beth shared this idea).

Earth Day Plans? – Beth Filar Williams (5-10 minutes)

• Working groups – anything yet?
• Others? brainstorm ideas now, in chat?
• We need to plan well ahead to run by EC of FS! (see next item…)
  • No lightning talks or other current plans for the Committee. Drake is involved in the planning. April 22-28 or thereabouts. Communications group will meet soon and include Drake and follow up on the beaver trash idea and circle back to the large group.

Co-Chairs Meeting with Faculty Senate President and Faculty Senate Office– Keith Jayawickrama (5 minutes)

• Faculty Senate President Kate MacTavish is interested and very supportive of the Committee.
• We have requested a meeting with President Murthy to update her on the carbon reduction goal, and to hear about her vision and ideas on the same.
• Important: The Faculty Senate (FS) wants all Committee sponsored activities (such as Lightning Talks) to be brought to them for Faculty Senate Executive Committee approval. This could take weeks at the earliest, and maybe more than a month. Plan ahead!

Committee Representatives Start a Conversation Within Your College\Division About Their Contributions to the Path to Carbon Neutrality – Keith Jayawickrama (8 minutes)

• Ideally include Deans\Assistant Deans\Department Heads in a meeting. We are told that OSU has a “Decentralized or Distributed Budget Model” so these administrators have considerable discretion on how money is spent.
  • E.g., we (Brandon Trelstad, Jon Dorbolo, Keith Jayawickrama) met with the College of Forestry Executive Committee in March 2020, and with the Department of Forest Ecosystems and Society (Brandon Trelstad, Keith Jayawickrama, Shelly Signs) in 2022.
• It is helpful for the Sustainability Office to give a presentation on the Path to Carbon Neutrality, OSU Carbon emissions numbers, Travel Carbon Offset program, annual sustainability report, or whatever else requested by the audience.
• Committee co-chairs can talk (briefly) about the Faculty Senate and Committee involvement.
• If possible, suggest some areas that College could make significant cuts to carbon emissions. Building level or College level information on energy use and efficiency would be very helpful – people like to focus on their particular situations. E.g., Buildings of College X generates Y tons of CO₂. This would take some time for the Sustainability Office to compile, but it is doable. We will need to schedule meetings well in advance to have time to do the necessary homework and research.
  • E.g., for the College of Forestry (COF), we highlighted the fact that Richardson Hall had a very inefficient heating and cooling system (a disproportionately high carbon footprint) and asked for the College to fund an energy study to help design a much more efficient system. COF did come up with the money, funds were obtained from the Energy Trust of Oregon and a major upgrade is in the works.
• Listen to administrators, faculty, staff and students about their carbon reduction ideas. They will be good ideas, some of them are difficult to implement, some may not lead to tangible carbon reductions as measured by OSU, some will have high costs for fairly small carbon emission reductions, but they should be heard out.
• If there is support within the college, the next step will be to work with the Sustainability Office, Facilities, the Control shop, budget managers to make the modifications and investments that are needed and feasible. These things take time, patience and persistence. For example, it may be necessary (and less expensive in the long term) to change an entire system rather than piecemeal changes.
• At some point after the meeting, people will want to get a progress report on successful initiatives (if any) in their colleges, such as installation of (1) new heating and cooling systems, (2) new control systems, and (3) solar panels.
• Laura Rees is interested in working with the College of Business leadership, Ed Dever with the College of Earth Ocean Atmospheric Sciences leadership, and Tess Collins the Carlson College of Veterinary Medicine. Jason Weiss has scheduled a meeting with the College of Engineering leadership.

Any Other Business (5 minutes)

• No other business

Next Meeting

• post WOHESC/mid-March, Date TBD (2 minutes)
• Notetaker for next meeting? Tess Collins?

Adjourned at 3:58 PM