Solar Program at Eckerd

    For my project, I wanted to address the solar program at Eckerd College. My work with the Office of Sustainability has allowed me to get a little more information than the average student on how implementing solar at Eckerd would work. We already have solar panels on the roof of Iota, and the next step is to move to MacArthur gymnasium. What a lot of people don’t know is that there is a lot of planning going into installing solar panels, including the power lines, roof levels, and cost. Funding is the biggest barrier to installing more solar panels on campus; the installation and initial cost is really expensive compared to how much it actually does save in the long run. I wanted to see if students would be willing to pay an extra fee at the beginning of the year, every year, to support the solar program. My example for the project was starting at a $10 fee. My goal was to achieve 100 votes on the poll, whereas I only got 25. 100 votes would be $1,000 towards the program; considering the school’s population is about 3,000, that could be $30,000 towards the solar program. That would be a significant chunk of the cost for installation and could help administration to be more inclined to implement these changes. I talked to Evan Bollier, the Director of Sustainability, to get some more information on the solar program here and what costs look like. The total cost of the installation of solar panels back in 2013 was $300,000, half of which was paid for by a grant that no longer exists. Solar panels also have a long return on investment, typically over 10 years, but right now at Eckerd they offset about $15,000 per year in electric costs. He mentioned that the new pavilion will also have solar panels, non-negotiable as requested by the donor. The problem with solar panels, in addition to the cost and long ROI, it is a lot easier and less expensive for the school to move to smaller projects, like switching out bulbs.

    To communicate the benefits of solar, I created a short website on the benefits of solar and at the bottom included a link to a Google Form. The form consisted of one question: would you be willing to pay an extra $10 fee at the beginning of the semester to support the solar program at Eckerd College? The answer was a resounding yes, with only 1 out of 26 people voting no. I wish I would have put a little more effort into the design of the website. I got a lot of people to open the website, but only a portion of them actually voted in the poll. If I had put the link to the poll at the top, or maybe bigger, it probably would have collected more responses; I think I overestimated the engagement in my website. I sent the link to the website out to as many people as I could, and used my own social media as well as visiting one of the Earth Day events to have students scan a QR code which brought them to the website. I think a website may have been a little dry for students. Another way I could have done advertising is by hanging up posters with QR codes. 

    Eckerd administration or sustainability initiatives are often criticized that they take part in ‘preformative activism’. I can see this in some ways, but I think students can often be hypocritical and too analytical of processes when they don’t see what is going on behind the scenes. I can relate to this, but it also made me think of the misinformation campaign we discussed in class. I tried to highlight the fact that the barrier to solar is mostly because of funding and structural issues, as many students are quick to blame administration without considering how they could support the school and aid in problem-solving. I also tried to frame the problem as a green-growth initiative, as funding is the main problem. In class, we discussed how this narrative is a little more difficult, as it requires action rather than just sitting back and hoping things will work out. I also found it interesting when Evan mentioned how the school knows we could allocate our funds somewhere else with a faster ROI and less money. I find this cognitive dissonance interesting, as we know that solar would have a much more significant impact on our emissions and the climate rather than switching out bulbs. We need students to be on board for this program to support it in order for it to work out. We also need to push for significant action from our leaders in addition to showing our support. Increasing solar on campus will allow the school to save money in the long run, which we can continue to put into green initiatives to further progress. This progress is not only good for the school and the environment, but the students as well. We should be able to stand behind our claim to being a green school.


Google Site: https://sites.google.com/eckerd.edu/solarenergyateckerd/home


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