Inside Climate News
Summary
Harvard University has taken two major steps toward reducing its greenhouse gas emissions, making significant investments in renewables and energy efficiency as it seeks to eliminate its use of fossil fuels by 2050.
To help fund ongoing emissions reductions, Harvard increased the size of its Green Revolving Fund—money the university spends on campus decarbonization efforts—from $12 million to $37 million. That makes it the largest such sustainability endowment in the nation.
Also in recent weeks, the university announced a novel renewable energy partnership with Mass General Brigham, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and eight other Boston-area institutions to help build and run a solar farm in Texas and a wind farm in North Dakota.
The university will now seek to harness its Green Revolving Fund to curb its direct emissions. Approximately two-thirds of Harvard’s 650 buildings are connected to one of two district heating systems, one in Cambridge and one across the Charles River in Boston, both of which are powered by natural gas. One alternative would be geothermal heating and cooling. Harvard was an early leader in small-scale geothermal systems that require far less energy than conventional heating and cooling systems.
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