The previous Energy Corps member in my position was able to purchase 1,500 energy efficiency and weatherization kits before leaving.  These kits include EE light bulbs, caulk, weather stripping, low-flow faucets and more energy saving items.  It is now my job to distribute these kits, completely free of charge, to the community’s low-to-moderate income families.  The kits will not only serve as an energy saver, but an educational tool to advance each beneficiary’s awareness and involvement in sustainability!

To date, the department and I have provided over 200 kits to members of the Fayetteville community.  To help increase our distribution, I’ve began to schedule short, educational events to local groups and then give away a kit to each attendee.  Last week, I held my first presentation to a senior citizen center.  This past Sunday, I set up an informational table at Trinity Methodist Church for their weekly, free community supper.  The response is always terrific!  Each person has been ecstatic to receive their new energy saving tools and typically very interested to learn more about energy saving opportunities and ideas.

This summer, I plan to organize a volunteer event using University students and other Fayetteville citizens interested in energy efficiency.  This event will have teams of volunteers traveling door-to-door, handing out kits and an increased energy education.

My position within the City has allowed me to work on many other projects as well.  The Community Services’ rehabilitation program has improved the conditions in over 100 homes since 2007.  Obtaining utility usage information, I can determine energy usage per household before a rehabilitation project compared to the energy usage after a project.  Hopefully, once this data is collected and analyzed, the Community Services Division will gain more support and publicity to continue these projects with more funding.

Using my background in engineering, I have partnered with the city’s Sustainability Division to begin managing lighting retrofits to many of the city’s buildings.  Thanks to the local electric utility company’s incentive programs, the city is able to do this at almost no cost!  For example, a lighting retrofit to a fire station quoted at $2,600 required only $500 after incentives.  With the reduction in energy usage from this project, the $500 will be paid off in 6 months.  I also hope to execute similar projects with local community buildings such as Trinity Methodist Church, the Senior Citizen’s center and more.

Fortunately, I am blessed with a strong group of EC members and employees here in Fayetteville.  The town, at large, is accepting and involved in sustainability.  All of this support makes implementing new initiatives incredibly comfortable and easy.  I am very excited to continue my service and hope that I can impact the community as strongly and positively as it has already impacted me!

Parker Higgs is serving with the City of Fayetteville Community Services Division.

Roxanne Li is serving with the Commission on Economic Opportunity in Pennsylvania.  She shared some of the work she has done on the Weatherization Innovation Pilot Program.

Say you’re a homeowner struggling to pay his/her bills each month, and someone tells you that you’re eligible for a free Home Energy Monitor (HEM)- a device that shows you exactly how much power your house is consuming at any given point in time, and how this power might translate into your energy bill. Would you eagerly snatch it up and start turning appliances on and off around the home to see where you could save the most on electricity? Or would it merely sit on your kitchen counter and gradually fade into the background as you continue with your every day routine?

Home Energy Monitor, ENVI model. Who wouldn’t want this in their home?

At the Commission on Economic Opportunity, we’re handing out these devices as part of the Weatherization Innovation Pilot Program to see if having a visual reminder of their home’s energy consumption will help our clients save on their electricity bills.

Every day, we visit our client’s homes, install the device, and sit with them for a one-on-one session on how they can go about saving electricity by tweaking their daily routines. One of my goals as an Energy Educator is to prevent the device from disappearing into the anonymity of household clutter by reminding them how they can use it to make energy saving choices such as washing clothes in cold water, minimizing the use of space heaters and turning off and unplugging appliances that aren’t in use. If used correctly, it has the potential to empower clients with a new level of energy conscientiousness that’s just not possible with a once-a-month energy bill.

Some clients have been incredibly enthusiastic and receptive to the idea, while with others you get the feeling that they’ll unplug it as soon as you walk out the door. It’s all part of the experimental process, and as the Energy Educator, you have to accept it and move on.

As a stickler for energy conservation, I’ve enjoyed the opportunity to talk with all sorts of people about what they’ve done, are doing, and will do to conserve energy. I’ve learned a lot of useful tidbits about energy-efficiency in homes, and I’ve been polishing my persuasion skills (“Pleaaaase take this HEM it is so cool!”). In all seriousness though, it’s been a fun month and a half as an Energy Educator, and I’m looking forward to where this experience will take me next.  

Roxanne Li graduated from Cornell University in May 2012 with a B.S. in Environmental Engineering and a minor in Sustainable Energy Systems. She then went on to complete a six month internship with an environmental consulting company in Johannesburg, South Africa. Roxanne will be working on the Weatherization Innovation Pilot Project at the Commission of Economic Opportunity (CEO) in Wilkes-Barre, PA. She will provide energy education for low-income households and develop strategies to overcome barriers related to behavior changes that could reduce residential energy consumption.

More than 60 people, including teens, attended an April 27 “Ground for Hope” Conference at Saint Margaret’s Episcopal Church in Little Rock, hosted by the church, Green Faith, and Arkansas Interfaith Power and Light.  The crowd included people from Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, and Baha’i traditions.  Quakers and Catholics side-by-side attended workshops on caring for the planet through conservation and a multitude of other issues related to energy and natural resources.

Arkansas Interfaith Power and Light provided a table with materials from Energy Corps and 96-page booklets from the Arkansas Energy Office on “30 Simple Things to Save Energy & Money.”  Nearly every conference participant picked up a booklet plus other materials, including applications for retrofits.

As an Energy Corps member and Executive Director of Arkansas Interfaith Power and Light, I offered a workshop on reducing energy consumption at home and in houses of worship.  Nine people attended, and we started by playing an Energy Bingo game offered through the National Energy Education Development (NEED) Project.  Through a fun game, participants learned about recycling, energy sources, energy consumption, kilowatt hours, and other fun facts.  I gave away faucet aerators, and several people signed up to receive monthly energy saving tips from Ark. IPL. All who attended completed a survey and indicated an increase in awareness and high levels of satisfaction with the workshop.

To build attendance for the conference, we posted advance photographs and video clips describing how people could apply for energy efficiency improvements.  The conference allowed Arkansas Interfaith Power and Light to increase its individual contacts and potential partners by more than 50 on that day.

What’s Next? E-Day at Hot Springs on May 19, similar to Earth Day in Little Rock on April 20, where Ark. IPL hosted a table with information from the Arkansas Energy Office and Energy Corps.

Arkansas IPL will host the presentation of a documentary – “DIRT! The Movie” – May 30 at the Oyster Bar.  A vegetarian meal will be served, and the movie will be followed by discussion.  The event is free and will allow Ark. IPL to reach out to young people.  Socket sealers will be given to all who attend, along with an explanation on their use and the benefits of insulating a home.  Donations will be accepted to go toward materials for future retrofit projects, and those energy efficiency improvements will be described for the group.  We hope this documentary presentation will be the first in a series.  The movie “NOURISH” is next.

Ark. IPL will partner with Saint James United Methodist Church in Pine Bluff, Bethany Baptist Church in Pine Bluff, Arkansas Sierra Club, and others for a retrofit project on June 15 at the Family Development Community Center.  We are in the process of determining the square footage of the building so that we can recruit an auditor to conduct a blower door test before and after the retrofit.

This summer, Ark. IPL will provide presentations for children enrolled in the Summer Laureate program, teens enrolled in Catholic Campaign for Human Development, an adult class at the Unitarian Church and more.  Arkansas IPL also will be part of a national conference October 16-19 at Ferncliff Camp, hosted by Presbyterians for Earth Care.

Faith in Place – We Do Windows

Arkansas IPL is currently is working with potential partners on “Faith in Place – We Do Windows,” a project which will provide low-income residents with simple, inexpensive insulating window inserts made with a wood frame, two layers of clean vinyl, and weather stripping.

All of these efforts allow Ark. Interfaith Power and Light and Energy Corps to reach out with a hopeful message about conserving natural resources and protecting the planet.

Scharmel Roussel

Scharmel Roussel is returning for a second year of service as an Energy Corps member.  She was a founding member of Arkansas Interfaith Power and Light in 2009. In 2012, she served the organization as Outreach Coordinator and will continue in that role in 2013.  Arkansas Interfaith Power and Light focuses on energy efficiency improvements at houses of worship and community service buildings in low-income areas.  Another focus is increasing awareness levels of energy conservation and other environmental issues at schools, summer camps, youth groups, and adult groups.  Scharmel serves on the Steering Committee for the Creation Care Conference in April, 2013 at St. Margaret Episcopal Church in Little Rock.

College campuses often compete to be the most athletic, artistic, or knowledgeable; however, the University of Arkansas recently competed to reduce electrical usage & emissions in residence halls. We competed to make our campus greener and the world a better place.

Before the competition kicked off, we received some feedback about our goals.  There was an issue with student apathy.  Residents in the halls regularly practiced wasteful habits because they “…don’t pay the bill.”  I asked myself, “How in the world can I convince these freshman students to change their practices when I have nothing to offer them in exchange?”

I set out with a mission: to create cultural and behavioral change at the University campus.  Our spirits were down; the school lacked the infrastructure that other successful campuses had.  UA had no sustainability representatives in residence halls, no previous energy conservation campaign in place, no easy way to climb the administrative chain, and no master messaging system for all students.  It seemed like an impossible task.

I heavily recruited and came up with an awesome team of passionate residents to help from within the residence halls.  They spread the word about the competition and educated residents about the impact they could have by learning a few good habits.  The leadership team chalked, wrote blogs, spread the word through social media, and even held events in their respective halls.  Through direct outreach and education, we managed to reduce a total of $6,205, which equates to 113,463 pounds of CO2.   Everyone was involved with our efforts for a successful competition.  Over 150 residents committed to at least one conservation behavior to achieve an overall decline in electrical usage.

UA OFS intern Andrea Love displays Mallory’s t-shirt design

I’m hoping that these students realized how easy it is to conserve energy.  All it takes is being mindful of your surroundings and actions.  18 halls were involved in the competition, which is approximately 4,750 students.  That’s 24 pounds of CO2 emissions per student avoided in only 3 weeks.  Imagine what could be saved if they continued the good habits throughout the rest of their lives.  That would be tremendous avoided costs and CO2 emissions.  The possibilities of benefits are endless.

It was the University’s first time to participate in Campus Conservation Nationals, but not the last.  The more we participate, the more popular the competition will become on campus, and (hopefully) the better the results!  The whole Campus Conservation Nationals 2013 competition reduced over 2,100,000 pounds of carbon dioxide since February 4, 2013.   There were 1444 participants joining for a good cause.  Imagine the possibilities.

Mallory Jenkins

Mallory is serving at the University of Arkansas Office for Sustainability.  Born and raised in North Alabama, she graduated from Auburn University in Environmental Design with a Sustainability minor.  She is an artist and musician passionate about the environment and people.  Mallory recently received her LEED GA accreditation and will be participating in Campus Conservation Nationals and RecycleMania.  Her main duties will be educating about energy usage and conservation, including conducting energy audits at the fraternity and sorority houses.

My service so far has taught me an important lesson: Energy efficiency and sustainability are difficult and require incredible attention to detail.

There is no quick, easy fix for a high energy bill. Air leaks through cracks no one has ever seen, heat flows through wood and metal between insulated cavities, insulation sags, and solar heating works far too well in the summer—even on homes that don’t list it as a feature. Recycling is no different. Economies of scale make it easy in and around big cities, but recycling is only just starting to become economically viable in many rural areas. And many of us who grew up near cities recycling our papers, cans, and bottles are unaware of the many details that allowed us to do that. Most of us never stopped to think about why the recycling bins at school were a certain size. We put paper in them and that was that. Glass bottles went into a bin marked “glass” and that was the last we saw or heard of them.

If you are trying to improve energy efficiency or recycling, you have to be able to find the air leaks, know how to size recycling bins to accommodate the volume of waste produced without violating fire codes, figure out how to use those broken glass bottles from the bin, and much, much more. The newer energy efficiency and recycling are to an area, the more important those details are. In Havre, the 8^th-largest city in Montana, recycling is a recent development facilitated by Energy Corps members and the non-profit Recycle Hi-Line. Because recycling is so new here, curbside pick-up is a long-term goal that won’t be realized until Havre sees a large increase in recycling rates. For now, we have to figure out the details of recycling on a case-by-case basis.

The District IV HRDC building (where my host organization has its offices) has arranged for a third party to take its recyclables to Pacific Steel and Recycling. Recycle Hi-Line partners with local businesses for a monthly recycle drive in a downtown parking lot. Some people sell their aluminum cans as scrap metal, while others donate them to non-profits that sell them to raise a few dollars. Commercially-sold recycling bins are rare. Most people and organizations here in Havre prefer either to improvise or build custom bins to keep costs down and to suit their means for transporting all that plastic, paper, and cardboard. In Havre, feed bags full of plastic and hand-built wooden bins keep recyclable materials out of the landfill and add a little character and charm to the city’s waste management infrastructure.

In some ways, getting involved in recycling in Havre has made me far more appreciative of the single-stream system my college had than I ever thought I could be. But on the other hand, putting cardboard in the old blue van out back then tossing a bag full of plastic into a bin whose maker works just down the hall makes me feel just a little bit more connected to the community. That’s one great advantage Havre’s fledgling recycling system has over a large, developed system—after all, recycling isn’t something most of us do for personal gain.

Evan Johnson is assisting Opportunity Link with environmental education and outreach programs to promote sustainable practices in North-Central Montana. A recent graduate of Carleton College with a BA in Geology, Evan thoroughly enjoys outdoor recreation, particularly running and rock climbing. He attended the Indiana University Geological Field Camp near Cardwell, MT and participated in several volunteer trips with Habitat for Humanity, helping build homes in places ranging from Hawaii to Kyrgyzstan.

On a typical morning I rise, spend a sacred moment with coffee, feed and water the goats and chickens, water the greenhouse, raised beds, and row crops, and then in similar fashion I can be found watering down walls at a large, unusual looking structure not far from the gardens.  They’re lime plaster walls and require water three times a day to prevent setting, which would stymie the lime crystals’ growth.

Ferncliff Eco Center under construction

The majority of my time over the past month was invested in this strange new building at Ferncliff Camp and Conference Center, a straw bale building dubbed the Eco Center.  Straw bales are a primary source of insulation in terms of availability and tradition—while perhaps today we consider it an “alternative” material, in fact straw structures date to the Paleolithic age.  Still, the Eco Center’s novelty is underscored not only by the relative rarity of straw bale insulation today, but the building’s other systems as well: adobe flooring in the living quarters, solar power, and thermal flooring heated by a large wood stove.  It will be an off-the-grid educational facility intended to educate and inspire its visitors to be mindful of resource consumption.  The utilities room is much larger than most with the idea of showcasing building’s systems rather than hiding them.

Kenny teaching EC members about straw bale construction

Although my role so far involves only informal outreach and education, it’s a joy to work on a project that I know will touch many lives in the coming years.  Solar Under the Sun, an international non-profit that trains groups to install solar powered water filtration systems in the developing world, will utilize this space as their campus, and other groups will stay year round experiencing a variety of programming options run by Ferncliff.  The hours are long and even after a month I feel that I’m still riding up a steep learning curve, but it’s for this reason that my memory now turns to the conclusion of Spinoza’s Ethics, one of my favorite works in western philosophy: “All excellent things are as difficult as they are rare.”

Lastly, the Energy Corps Arkansas team came to stay at Ferncliff last week.  It was a special pleasure to relax with my cohort for a couple days of good food, conversation, and music.  Through their presentations I felt rejuvenated in our shared sense of values and mission, which we might otherwise struggle to tease out of our daily work lives.  The work of Energy Corps—and of AmeriCorps more broadly—is difficult, and unfortunately the choice to turn towards service is increasingly rare.

Kenny Lackey

Born and raised on the Virginian peninsula, Kenny took an early interest in the environment through the farmland and Chesapeake waterways and frequent trips to the Blue Ridge Mountains.  After graduate studies in Boston focusing on Philosophy and Theology, he volunteered on a Pennsylvania farm that altered the course of his life and his relationship to the natural world.  Within a year, he transitioned to life as a full-time farmer.  After one season apprenticing in New York, Kenny moved to Arkansas to work as a farm education volunteer with Heifer Ranch.  Kenny is thrilled to join Energy Corps with a shared vision of sustainable living, environmental awareness, and community engagement.

This week the service members from Energy Corps, Food Corps, Episcopal Service Corps, and Americorps Vista came together to celebrate the Mayor’s Day of Recognition for National Service in Fayetteville.  This event took place across the country, and we were fortunate enough to have Fayetteville’s Mayor Lioneld Jordan join us at the Town Center for an official proclamation.  Mayor Jordan thanked the Americorps community for its work and pointed out that Fayetteville has a reputation for being a service-oriented community.  In 2012, over 35,000 of Fayetteville’s 73,000 residents volunteered at some point, and as a community we recorded more volunteer hours than any other town in the state.  Following the mayor’s speech we posed for a group photo before heading out for a combined day of service.

Mayor’s Day of Recognition for National Service in Fayetteville, AR April 9th, 2013

We began our day at the Yvonne Richardson Center, a non-profit community center that provides educational and recreational opportunities for youths in Fayetteville. Part of their programming involves a community garden where kids can learn gardening basics and other skills like rainwater harvesting. We joined forces with staff from the Richardson Center and the Fayetteville Parks and Recreation department to spruce up the garden for springtime. With unparalleled efficiency we unloaded a trailer full of mulch and spread it between the garden beds. For those not pushing wheelbarrows or shoveling mulch, there were plenty of weeds to remove – a task performed with zeal by some of our Food Corps friends, who no doubt have pulled their fair share of weeds.

Alas, our time in the garden was not over. After bidding our friends at the Richardson Center farewell, we went across town to Tri Cycle Farms, an urban farm in the heart of Fayetteville. Aside from growing delicious food, Tri Cycle is also involved in combating the issue food insecurity in our community. Washington County has the third highest level of food insecurity in Arkansas, a state in which more than 1 in 4 children are food insecure. Tri Cycle works to alleviate this food insecurity by providing farm-related training and sharing a large portion of its harvest with the surrounding community – many of whom stop by on work days to volunteer on the farm.

Luckily, in addition to Tri Cycle and the Yvonne Richardson Center, we have a lot of other dedicated farmers and gardeners in Fayetteville who are working to bring us closer to our food. The fine folks at Feed Fayetteville, whose mission statement is “Creating community food security by cultivating a sustainable local food network” have compiled a database of food access resources, which can be found here. Clearly, our community faces plenty of challenges – particularly when it comes to food insecurity. But the Mayor’s Day of Recognition was a wonderful reminder of all the work that is being done here and of all the volunteers and service corps members who tirelessly work to make our community a better place.

Ben Maddox

A Fayetteville native, Ben Maddox graduated from the University of Central Arkansas in 2011 where he specialized in the political economy of international relations.  He will serve with the Fayetteville Solid Waste and Recycling division, where his primary responsibilities include environmental education, public outreach, and program development.  He will work to increase waste diversion and recycling participation through targeting underserved portions of the population, particularly apartment residents and businesses.  This is Ben’s second Americorps position after previously serving with the U.S. Forest Service in Southern California.

Stretching over the water, I just managed to grab the foam cup that was snagged in some roots in the cold Scull Creek.  I clambered up the stream bank and through thick brambles to get a tattered plastic grocery bag caught around a tree where the spring floods had left it stranded.  I spent the whole morning of the Scull Creek Clean-Up this way: scrambling through brush, hopping from rock to rock across the creek, and tempting fate leaning over the water to get at all the litter I could see.  What I found the most of was the detritus that is the remains of take-out food and single-use packaging—straws, ketchup packets, plastic grocery bags, polystyrene cups and clamshells, coffee cups, soda bottles—repeated reminders of how much needless waste is generated daily in our society.

Fellow Energy Corps member Ben Maddox cleaning Scull Creek.

Before becoming an Energy Corps Member with the City of Fayetteville Solid Waste and Recycling Division, the most I thought about trash was that littering was bad and recycling was good—beyond that I didn’t think much about the huge logistical challenges of waste management in towns and cities, and I didn’t think overly much about the excessive amounts of waste created in this country.  Since starting my work here, I have learned a great deal about waste and much of it is shocking and discouraging—but it is a problem that we can have a profound impact on with our everyday choices.

I have learned, for example, that in the United States, every year, we throw away enough paper and plastic cups, forks and spoons to circle the equator 300 times.  In our culture of busy days and little time for mindfulness, let alone a sit-down dinner, we have become accustomed to such waste, and barely even notice it anymore.  But as I was cleaning the banks of Scull Creek with 269 other volunteers on a cold Saturday morning this winter, I noticed, and I started asking questions.  Why are we expending energy manufacturing things we will only use once and then send to the landfill, or worse yet, dump in our creeks?  How did we get to the point where this makes any kind of sense?

I have learned that we as a culture didn’t just wake up one morning and decide to start being wasteful.  After all, for many decades thrift was a virtue in this country—reusing cloth flour sacks, saving buttons, patching clothes, and feeding whatever food scraps there were to pigs.  But under this ethos, people weren’t consuming everything that newly mechanized factories could produce.  To address this “problem,” manufacturers teamed with advertisers and made a concerted effort to create the consumer culture (i.e., the throw-away culture) we live in today.  In 1929, President Herbert Hoover’s Committee on Recent Economic Changes observed that because of advertising campaigns, “economically we have a boundless field before us; that there are new wants which will make way endlessly for newer wants, as fast as they are satisfied.”  Advertisers used their powers of persuasion to make people want more things “endlessly” simply to help companies sell more goods.  The rise of single-use items epitomizes this.  Why just own one reusable coffee mug or water bottle and use it for years when you could buy new ones and throw them away every day of the year?

In 1980, the average person generated 152 lbs of municipal solid waste (MSW) per year.  In 2009, the average person generated 243 lbs of MSW per year.  What has changed in our lives in the last 30 years that has led to this dramatic increase?  It was hardly the Stone Age in 1980—we wouldn’t have to change our lifestyle too drastically to get back to that level of waste generation.  And we have made so many technological advances since then, and have greater awareness of environmental issues now; maybe we could reduce our waste to even lower levels.  Recycling has become an everyday part of most people’s lives, and it is an effective waste diversion practice for those products that we can’t avoid buying.  However, reducing the amount of waste created to begin with will ultimately save the most energy and resources.  Maybe someday soon it will no longer be the social norm to create so much needless waste.

One of the litter collection locations, where we piled the trash to be collected and disposed of by the City of Fayetteville.

Picking up trash along a muddy creek might not strike most people as an enjoyable activity, but I found the Scull Creek Clean-Up to be extremely satisfying.  It was a hands-on way to make things perceptibly better.  That morning as I was collecting litter, I got off into the brush by myself for a while, and let my imagination wander.  As I collected plastic bottles and rusting metal cans, I began fantasizing about coming across a stash of gold or something like that—not the most selfless daydream, I admit.  But as I continued to pull plastic out of the creek, I realized that every piece of plastic I get out of the urban ecosystem is gold.  Every piece that might have eventually made its way to the floating plastic gyre in the Pacific Ocean, that we kept out of the belly of a bird or fish was gold.  Every foam cup or chip bag that had marred the landscape but that now was going to where it belonged, the landfill, was gold.  The group of volunteers collected 1.5 tons of gold that morning, made a stretch of Scull Creek cleaner, and hopefully made a few people question the logic of our wasteful ways.

Resources cited:

http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/2962

http://earth911.com/news/2010/06/21/recycling-to-go-plastics/

http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0377.pdf

Nina Prater

Nina Prater grew up in Vermont, but relocated to balmy Cedarville, Arkansas in 2007.  She lives with her husband and daughter on Cedar Creek Farm, raising animals sustainably and humanely.  In 2012, she received her master’s degree in Soil Science from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.  She is currently serving as an Energy Corps member with the City of Fayetteville Solid Waste and Recycling Division, and is excited to help Fayetteville meet its recycling goals!

MILWAUKEE, Wisc. – I arrived in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on a foggy evening.  I had dreamed the fog would clear by morning, the sun would come out, and spring would be here. Alas, I woke up to a light dusting of snow and below freezing weather; it’s a good thing I brought my big winter coat.  Any other time in the winter, this morning would have been picturesque. I would have planned a day of sipping hot cocoa and snuggling into a giant comforter.

It is easy to say that it is not the kind of morning you expect to have on your way to a training workshop on urban farming, but Growing Power isn’t what you expect.  It’s about dismantling preconceived notions.  To quote Will Allen, CEO & Founder of Growing Power, “I grew a million pounds of food on just a few acres, in the dead of winter-without heating.”

The workshop began with breakfast and introductions: Who are you? How are you trying to impact your community? How did you hear about Growing Power?

Hi, I’m Audrey. I am an Energy Corps service member for Imagine Grinnell, a quality of life and environmental non-profit in Iowa.  I work on energy efficiency and local food efforts and as a part of that, I am Director of the Grinnell Community Garden. I heard about Will Allen and Growing Power in a new class in college when I realized my interest in food systems and local food was something I could academically learn about, too.

There were local food movers and shakers from across the country and from right in town.  Some of them were new to local food and for others it had been a continuing presence throughout their life.  I met current farmers, future farmers, non-profit business starters, and garden and community lovers. All were interested in sustainability.  It was an exciting group to be with.

We walked around the two acres, seeing first hand the millions of pounds of food being grown on site.  It was entirely impressive and heartwarming to see.  There is something about being surrounded by thousands of little seedlings poking their green little heads out of this deep dark chocolate brown soil while it is snowing outside that was amazing.  I had never seen soil so healthy in my life and especially not soil like that while the rest of the Midwest is still frozen outside.

During the Compost and Vermicompost, we met with John, a soil scientist and farmer.  He taught us the compost portion.  At Growing Power, they have a two tier system of composting. First, they compost in large quantities, partnering for pickups and deliveries with businesses around the area for leftover fruits, veggies, beer mash, coffee grounds, etc!  Second, they add the mixed compost to the vermicompost.  I am not sure of the science behind it, but the soil they were producing was beautiful.

Will Allen told me during the workshop on Composting and Vermicomposting “to never let anyone tell me something can’t be done.” The day ended with a group dinner, where we had local drinks and lots of greens from the greenhouse.

On the second day, I took intensive, hands-on training offering diverse groups the opportunity to learn, plan, develop, operate, and sustain community food projects.  I brought Will’s advice to this workshop, feeling empowered.

The workshop was run by Laurell Sims and Erika Allen, Will’s daughter and one of my personal heroes.  Both of them run the Growing Power in Chicago.   They challenged us to talk about big visions—what do we want to do and what is the outcome.  Next, we had a brain storming session on our own to create a visual of the vision.  I loved taking my concrete ideas and visualizing them.  It was exciting, helpful, and therapeutic all at the same time.  Afterwards, we presented our visions.  I spoke of the Grinnell Gleaning Project that I am trying to get off the ground.  The Grinnell Gleaning Project is designed to send a volunteer group to collect extra fruit and produce from the trees and gardens that individuals register. The fresh fruits and vegetables will then go to the food bank, MICA, or to be enjoyed at Grinnell’s weekly community meal.  With it, I hope it increases access to healthy and delicious foods; it will utilize established resources while filling bellies and creating community.

There was so much that happened at the workshop, it would be impossible to explain it all.  I hope to keep everything I learned fresh and continue to share the knowledge in the coming days, weeks, months, years.  I’ll leave you with a last request:

Figure out whatever your vision is and go do it.  Start today.

Audrey is a graduate of Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. While in college, she took a term off to better understand the ways of low-impact living and was a sustainable farm apprentice at Nature’s Way Farm in Henderson, IL. After college, she worked on a winning State Senate Campaign in Illinois for a Senator who champions local food. Audrey is now taking Imagine Grinnell’s energy education efforts and working to make them hands-on. She maintains the Home Energy Audit Toolkits and is wo   rking to create a community based volunteer audit and weatherization team. Additionally, she is designing an interactive Powesheik County Energy Guide. Audrey is continuing several projects focused on local foods, including a revamping the Grinnell community garden. She is hoping to restore the wetland prairie at Grinnell Middle School to make into an outdoor classroom.

Greetings to you from North Eastern Pennsylvania!  This is Energy Corps member Whitney Fenton, writing from the Kingston, PA office of the Commission on Economic Opportunity, where I began my eleven month term in November of last year.  As you’ve stumbled upon this blog, there is a good chance that you are interested in conservation issues.  I hope that’s the case because I think they’re important too!  The environmental problems we face today can be overwhelming, so to start, I just want to share this encouraging little video from dirt!:

Keep on keeping on, hummingbird.

In terms of potential influence, the Department Of Energy (DOE) is more like the elephant than the hummingbird in that story.  I’ve been privileged to spend the majority of my service, so far, working on a DOE project called the Weatherization Innovation Pilot Program (WIPP).  The project is an aspect of the Department of Energy’s Weatherization & Intergovernmental Program (WIP).  Where WIP is a set of programs designed to increase energy efficiency in the United States, WIPP is one of those programs focused on keeping the measures and practices of the weatherization assistance offered under WIP up to date with current technological advancement and as cost effective as possible.

In practice, the WIPP work carried out at my host site is aimed at meeting a perceived need of electricity consumers for access to timely information about their energy usage so as to increase power use efficiency at the consumer level.  By providing clients with “home energy displays”, WIPP improves client energy consumption information availability from a current once monthly report to a constant steady stream of real time usage data.  In addition, the program requires Energy Corps members to take time to discuss conservative and in-home energy use habits with clients.  Following installations, our WIPP program tracks the energy saving success of the two measures.  Tiffany Welch, a former Energy Corps member wrote a  blog post regarding WIPP in February of this year that is worth checking out to learn more about the program.  Additionally, a recent news article in the region’s Citizen’s Voice highlights a day in the life of an Energy Corps member here in Kingston.

One cool aspect of our WIPP project is that, while not directed by the policy, the WIPP work also happens to be pertinent to Congress’ Statement of Policy on Modernization of the Electricity Grid, Title XIII- section 1307.  The clause states “Purchasers shall be provided with the number of electricity units, expressed in kwh, purchased by them… on no less than a daily basis”.  Section 1302, meanwhile, requires extensive and timely reporting on measures enacted in response to the policy.  The WIP program is aimed at helping clients afford their energy bills; the Smart Grid movement is focused on making sure that there is sufficient power available to all clients.  Both are related as they have an emphasis on energy conservation.   My work allows me to address both policies.

In regards to the progress of our WIPP initiative, I’m happy to report, we’re nearing the number of device installations set as a goal at the outset of the program.  Following the final installations, we’ll continue to analyze the device’s success at helping clients save energy before a decision is made about whether and how to implement the device and education measures on a broad scale.  Also, our host site is surveying current and former Energy Corps educators to develop a set of best practices for introducing our in-home energy conservation content to clients.

I spend about half my time on the road commuting from home to home.  I’ve enjoyed working out the details of the mental map of the region that develops as my familiarity increases.  I’m learning the path of the East fork of the Susquehanna, and the headwaters of the Schuylkill, and the ridge lines of the folds of mountains.  I’ve enjoyed the process of learning of the region’s businesses, administrations, anecdotes, histories, problems, crimes, people, and organizations.   There is a shared history of the region that saw small farming communities boom in the mid-19^th century as coal production increased and then slowly lose economic standing as other, less expensive energy options became popular during The Great Depression and the decades that followed.  The growth of our nation was sponsored in part by this region

A non-WIPP related aspect of my Energy Corps term that has impacted my view on energy conservation is the region in which I’m serving.  North Eastern Pennsylvania grew rapidly in the mid-19^th century due to the anthracite mining industry.  Following the Great Depression, however, many coal consumers switched to cheaper fuel sources and the industry shrank just as rapidly as it had grown to the low that it is now.   In the midst of a landscape permanently impacted by the mining that took place in the last century, the region is still redefining itself economically following the decline of its former largest source of income.  Fuel extraction is, by nature, an industry that booms locally then dries up leaving the cities and towns that grew up alongside it in difficult economic straits.  Additionally, fuel extraction, by nature, tends to expose the earth’s surface to pollution and contaminants that are harmful ounce churned out of their resting place.  Many of the natives of this region are now tied to its geographic history because their very families were instrumental in mining it into its current shape.  Meanwhile, many of those family members had health impacted by their roles in the mines.  The anthracite extracted during the height of the region’s coal mining industry has long since been burned for heat or as fuel for the industrial revolution.

Miners in a shaft in North Scranton, PA.  Robert N. Dennis collection of stereoscopic views

This heritage is not only history for the region of North East Pennsylvania, but a recurring reality as the region now finds itself home to a new fuel extraction industry, fracking.  Living where the potential impacts of the controversial industry are deeply felt has allowed me to value opportunities to encourage energy conservation even more.  In the midst of controversy, I have no answers to our need for fuel, but I do have tips to make conservative choices when using energy in your home.

There are many facts and statistics that reinforce, for me the importance of my service.  Over the next seven years, electricity prices are forecast to increase 50%.  During the winter of 2007/08, 20% of Americans fell behind in their energy payments and an astonishing 8.7 million American consumers were disconnected from utility services.

I can’t put out the fire but, household by household, I, have a chance to be like the hummingbird, to fight the fire as best I can.  There are daily reminders in the region I’m serving about why it is important to do so.

Whitney Fenton graduated in May of 2012 from Gordon College in Wenham, MA with a B.S. in Biology and minors of study in outdoor education and chemistry. She’s held a variety of positions including backpacking trip leader, food service worker, and college Sustainability Tracking, Assessment, and Rating Systems intern. She also participated in landscape ecology research during her undergrad years. This year, she’s looking forward to learning a great deal about energy efficient technology and a chance to invest my education and experience in a mission I love.

In her role as an Energy Corps member she will be providing home assessments and education to PA residents seeking to decrease their energy consumption and lower their monthly utility bills. Additionally, she plans to research and develop the Energy Corps’ set of best practices for effectively helping communities reduce their energy consumption.