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Leading the Sustainability Charge
Kathy Lambert '90 knows how far the College has come, and how far it has to go
In August, Kathy Lambert '90 took over as the College's sustainability coordinator. Her first challenge was organizing a "sustainable lunch" for the entire campus in September that, through recycling and composting, reduced 700 pounds of waste to 70. Her next challenge is even bigger: to help guide the campus to meet President James Wright's ambitious goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Though the College has been praised as a sustainability leader, earning an "A-minus" for the third year in a row from the Sustainable Endowments Institute, Lambert has her work cut out for her. One advantage: she knows how far the College has already come.
Were you active in environmental issues as an undergraduate?
Definitely. I went to Kenya in the environmental studies FSP program with Jeff Hornig—chemistry professor and founder of the environmental studies program. I was co-chair of the environmental studies division, which at the time was one of the only environmental groups on campus, along with the Outing Club. Now, there are almost too many groups to count.
A number of projects from those days were near and dear to my heart. In 1989, when recycling and trash was one of the major environmental issues that we were trying to grapple with on campus, we created the first campaign where volunteers would carry all the trash they generated in a week. We distributed clear plastic bags and the participating students carried all their trash around to class and everywhere else they went. At the end of the week we piled it all on the Green, weighed it so we'd know exactly how much they had produced, and finally recycled what we could. It was a major awareness-raising exercise that caught the attention of the New York Times and other media. We also helped Dartmouth Recycles get going.
What brought you back to Dartmouth?
I'd been working on broad policy issues in the past five years and saw this as an opportunity to make a difference in a more tangible way. I think that sustainability that combines changes people can make in their everyday lives with how businesses and institutions do their work represents the new frontier. So it was a chance to go from what was really becoming the old way of doing environmental work into what I see as the more forward-thinking approach.
Looking at sustainability on a micro level, you have a certain number of students coming every year who maybe, at this point in their lives, still have difficulty putting dirty dishes into the dishwasher. How do you engage them in, say, recycling or even larger projects?
This is at the core of our challenge. A certain number of students are inclined to do this work anyway. Hopefully we'll provide support to further the work they're already doing. Student role models are probably the best way to do it. The other goal is providing real information about the impacts of students' behavior. I think that most students are coming to realize that being a good citizen, a leader in the 21st century, means making these changes in their own lives and encouraging others to do the same.
On a macro level, what will it take for Dartmouth to achieve an A-plus in the sustainability ratings and achieve President Wright's goals?
We always want to strive for the A-plus. There are a couple of ways to do that. We received a C in administration because we only have one staff person dedicated to sustainability. Many of our peers have more than that. In the short term, we can create a team that cuts across departments and uses people that are already working on sustainability issues, and make that team visible to raters, so that they can see the depth of our commitment. And, of course, we can take a hard look at whether one fulltime staffer is enough—but that's more of a long-term goal.
President Wright's goals are also going to help us. Broadly, we need to do three things: upgrade the energy efficiency of existing old campus buildings, explore our options for developing alternative and renewable energy sources on campus, and implement a demand side energy conservation program with students, faculty, and staff. The trustees have allocated $12.5 million dollars to upgrade energy efficiency. And that will get us very far along in achieving our goals. The renewable and alternative energy piece is a bit harder. We don't have a natural gas pipeline nearby. We use number 6 heating oil right now, which is very high in greenhouse gas emissions per unit of energy it generates. So we have to look more aggressively at solar thermal and solar electric, as well as wind and other sources. And we can look at College land to see if there are opportunities to mitigate some of what we emit. The 27,000-acre Second College Grant is probably where there's the best potential for that.
What we're not doing right now, which makes us a bit different from other institutions, is we're not relying on buying third-party offsets. Which is very important. We're committed to achieving our goals by making improvements here on campus, not trying to buy our way out of the problem. In that respect, the president has made a very strong commitment, even though the end goal may not seem as lofty as what other colleges and universities are doing. In reality, on the ground, I think we'll be doing more.
There are a wide variety of sustainability activities on campus. Do you have a favorite?
My favorites are the activities that have been generated by the students, because they are the most inspired of anything we're doing. You look at the Organic Farm, which originated from a student idea. You look at the Big Green Bus—that's a student idea. You look at the new sustainable living center; again, that's a student idea. Those, so far, are my favorites because they're creative and they probably long term will be defining some of the more innovative changes we can make. And they came from students.