An energy-research center at Florida State University plans to work with a local green-housing development to build a renewable-power plant that will provide enough energy for the development and then some, according to an article in the Orlando Sentinel.

FSU’s Energy & Sustainability Center struck a deal with Jim Lark, who is the founder of the 475-home development called Harmony. “The university plans to build a 5-megawatt power plant that uses solar thermal energy combined with the gas created by burning biomass, or organic matter,” the story says. “That’s enough to power an average of 2,000 homes. Construction is set to start in the fall and is expected to be completed in 18 months.”

“The plant won’t use conventional solar panels, which capture the...

Alumni magazines are too often merely tools of a college’s fund-raising and public-relations departments, with insipid rah-rah stories about campus figures and administration agendas. Well, chalk one up for the independence of the Yale Alumni Magazine, which reports on the controversy surrounding the university’s decision to tear down some historic structures to make way for two new residential colleges designed in a neo-Gothic style by Robert A.M. Stern, the university’s architecture dean.

“Massive demolition of historic buildings is, in its way, a time-honored Yale tradition,” notes the writer, Carole Bass. “That’s how the university cleared space for its original residential colleges more than 75 years ago.” Among the buildings to be ...

Sustainability advocates in higher education are circulating a letter among college presidents, asking for their support for a plan to set aside 1 percent of the proceeds from carbon-emissions allowances — potentially $1-billion — for education in the fields of clean energy, environmental literacy, and sustainability.

The letter and the plan, called “1% for Education,” will be presented to leaders in the U.S. Senate, who are hammering out a cap-and-trade bill similar to one passed by the House of Representatives two weeks ago. More than 100 college leaders have signed the letter. Organizers plan to deliver the letter to lawmakers by Friday.

“As presidents of colleges and universities across the nation, we stand ready to provide leadership in the nation’s transition to a clean-energy economy,” the letter says in...

Is this a fantasy deal for higher education? T. Boone Pickens is giving up (at least temporarily) on his plan to build the world’s largest wind farm in Texas, and his company “is looking for other projects that could use the $2-billion worth of wind turbines already on order,” according to a story in today’s Washington Post. Apparently, with capital markets in disarray, Mr. Pickens could not borrow money for the $2-billion in transmission lines needed to connect the wind farm to the grid.

Colleges have shown a growing interest in wind power in recent years, but in some cases they have also had trouble just putting in orders for turbines, because of high demand. Surely, Mr. Pickens’s company, Mesa Power, will try to find a buyer for the turbines among major wind projects in North...

The Minnesota State Colleges and Universities system plans to ask the State Legislature for $406-million to pay for building needs, including repairs, at the various state colleges and community colleges, according to an article in Finance and Commerce.

The story says that the Legislature has denied financing for a handful of projects over the last few years, which means that projects are piling up and space is tight on some campuses. The state-college has complained in the past that it also has a crippling deferred-maintenance backlog.

The reporter toured North Hennepin Community College with Ann Wynia, the president:

With burgeoning enrollment ...

The Brookings Register has a story about a straw-bale house that was built by students in McCrory Gardens at South Dakota State University. The 900-square-foot house will be used as a meeting and classroom facility.

Straw-bale building is an increasingly popular construction method, particularly in the West, where the climate is dry. Susceptibility to rot from moisture is one of the main weaknesses of straw-bale construction. Otherwise, the buildings are extremely strong, resistant to fire, and energy efficient.

A story in the Grand Forks Herald reminds the college administrator of the virtues of a great location — and the challenges of making a bad one better.

Minot State University, in North Dakota, is situated next to a cemetery that is the resting place of early settlers of the area and those who helped found the college. Minot State officials have not always been thrilled about this tie to history, the story notes.

One past president pondered planting trees to obscure the view. A state legislator suggested all the graves in the cemetery be moved elsewhere. Current MSU president David Fuller informed him that the university would have to get permission from the relatives of every person buried in the cemetery. The legislator thought the law should be changed so it would be easier to move the cemetery away...

A recent entry on the Greening the Campus blog opens with a provocative question: “Would you wash your hands with a fire hose?”

Richard Johnson, director of sustainability at Rice University, discusses the problem of “over-designing” various systems in buildings, which leads to waste. His blog entry focuses on a heating-and-cooling system in a recently designed building on the Rice campus:

[The] engineering consultant originally recommended 2,000 tons of cooling. An internal team from Rice whittled this down to 300 tons of cooling — an 85-percent reduction. To date, the building’s actual consumption has not peaked above 40 tons, although it eventually will. The difference between the original recommendation and the actual peak from operations to date is a factor of 50. That’s over-design! As a comparison...

Amid pressure from environmentalists and regulators, Northern Michigan University is dropping its plans for a cogeneration plant that would be partly dependent on coal, the Associated Press reports.

The 10-megawatt plant would have burned wood and wood by-products and used coal as a backup fuel, but the university asked the state to void its permit for the plant, the article says.

According to a news release from the university, the Sierra Club had been one of the lead groups opposing the coal plant.

The university will apply for a new permit for a plant that burns only wood. “We believe, once built, the cogeneration plant will result in significant cost savings to NMU and further the university’s sustainability efforts,” said Gavin Leach, vice...

The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education has released its 2008 digest of campus undertakings in sustainability, which essentially collects the news items sent out in AASHE’s weekly e-mail messages. The 356-page document, which is available free online, covers education and curriculum, staff development, buildings, carbon-emissions programs, dining services, grounds, transportation, waste, and other areas.

A news release for the report ticks off some of the numbers from the past year: Almost 300 campuses signed the American College & University Presidents Climate Commitment, 130 green buildings were planned or built, more than 60 sustainability-focused academic programs were created, and 13 sustainability-research...