>>ANNOUNCER: Promoting a healthy environment
it's the air we breathe
clean, safe water
responsible management of our natural resources
to protect and restore
for a sustainable future -
environment manners...
>>JASON ARNOLD: With solar, once it's installed
it's there.
and, you know, once it's paid for it and it's just making you money...
>>GREG ADOLFSON: Harnessing the power of the sun -
DEP headquarters in Charleston is going solar.
a newly installed solar array will help provide power and hot water to the
facility for years to come.
Plus, some students in Fayette County will be breathing a little easier this fall
thanks to some new
clean diesel school buses.
Hello everyone and welcome to Environment Matters. I'm Greg Adolfson with
the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection.
I'll be filling in for Kathy for the next few episodes.
It's an unlimited source of clean energy that is free for the taking -
we're talking about the sun and this month
our headquarters here in Charleston
became the first state agency in West Virginia to take advantage of it.
Work began in early July as crews used a crane to
hoist the parts for the twenty five kilowatt solar array up on the roof.
Based on current usage,
the twenty seven hundred square foot array will provide nearly 15 percent
of the building's power needs.
Four flat plate collectors will use the sun to heat water that's stored in two 120
gallon tanks
to help provide hot water to the building as well.
>>JASON ARNOLD: We got 108 panels.
We're using three inverter which
tie into a three phase system here.
>>GREG ADOLFSON: The panels produced direct current - DC power.
the inverters convert that to alternating current - AC power which can be used for
anything from lights to computers to air conditioning - and it's clean power.
>>JASON ARNOLD: We're not putting out any
emissions. We're not
harming the environment any and
were also creating a power production
spource that
doesn't really have...
Once it's up and running there's no continuous
sort of overhead
with solar, once it's installed
it's there and once it's paid for
it's just making you money.
>>GREG ADOLFSON: Solar power still has a relatively high initial cost
but thanks to advances in design and technology as well as tax incentives to
help offset the cost, installers say a typical home system can pay for itself
in as little as five to six years which is just a fraction of the system's
useful lifespan.
>>PABLO DEL'AGUILA: The panels themselves are guaranteed to be making eighty percent of what they're
making right now
in twenty-five years, and that's a linear guarantee
and after that they will still be producing energy, just not quite as much.
Within thirty years you're still going to be making electricity on your roof.
>>GREG ADOLFSON: The project here at DEP is designed to be a model and a demonstration of the
feasibility of solar power for other state agencies to follow.
Promoting a healthy environment as the mission of the West Virginia Department
of Environmental Protection and by taking advantage of clean renewable solar
energy
we're doing just that.
Planning for the project actually began back in 2010.
The project is funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment
Act and the United States Department of Energy.
Once the system becomes fully operational
it will include several interactive features that will allow visitors to
monitor the energy the system is producing in real-time.
Summer usually means a break from school for students and teachers alike but
as the DEP's Tom Aluise recently found out,
for one group of teachers
time spent in a special outdoor classroom
could lead to some new approaches for reaching students this fall.
>>VOICE OFF CAMERA: The story is going to be on page 119...
>>NARRATION: This is not your typical classroom... >>VOICE OFF CAMERA: the Mystery of Sandy Bottom Creek...
>>NARRATION: but these are not your typical students - they're a group of seventh and
eighth grade science and social studies teachers getting some hands on work at
the Ward Hollow Wildlife Habitat. Ward Hollow is a ten acre wooded and grassy
wetland located near the rear of the Dow Technology Park in Kanawha County.
>>STEPHANIE HELMAN: It's a totally different way of learning and a lot of kids that will not respond
to regular or traditional means as far as books
and read the chapter and answer the questions -
they will respond to something like this in a heartbeat
and it makes it much more relevant to them.
>>NARRATION: And that learning can have a big impact down the road
but it's about more than just a future career choice.
>>SUSAN LYONS: If they learn that
what they did a is going to have an impact on
future generations,
they might decide
to really think about
how they're using the world around them
maybe in a more positive way.
>NARRATION: Students will get a chance to experience the ecology of Ward Hollow first hand
in this fall.
Dow makes the area available to educational groups by appointment.
It's something Dow's Marianne Szul says inspires some pretty creative learning.
>>MARIANNE SZUL: Some of them have made videos. THey brought still cameras and then video cameras out there and made a
little commercial about why you want to have a wetland, why you want to protect it.
Some of them have done scavenger hunts - looking to see what kinds of plants
and animals they could find out in the area. Some of them have done water sampling, soil sampling...
We have a microscope - a digital microscope that hooks up to a computer so they
can bring those tools out here and kind of relat it to what they've learned
in the classroom. >>NARRATION: And for a lot of those kids that's an eye-opening experience.
>>MARIANNE SZUL: and that's what we're hoping for. What we saw last year when we brought students out here that a lot of
of them had never experienced anything like that. They had no idea
that something like this existed in their backyard so it was nice to be able to
bring them out, let them see something that they don't normally see and
see how we've used something that they didn't know was here to benefit them.
>>NARRATION: A benefit these teachers hope leads their students to a better understanding of
the world around them.
In South Charleston, I'm Tom Aluise for Environment Matters.
>>GREG ADOLFSON: Ward Hollow Wildlife Habitat was dedicated in 2009.
Some students in Fayette County will be breathing a little easier this fall
thanks to four new clean diesel technology school buses that replace four
older, less efficient buses.
As the DEP's Mike Huff found out,
cleaner air for students is just one benefit of the program.
The first thing you notice is the smell -
or more correctly, the lack of one coming from the tailpipe of these new buses.
>>RENU CHAKRABARTY: We're getting reductions of particulate matter, hydrocarbons... NOX
emissions... So they're cleaner.
>>NARRATION: Renu Chakrabarty works
in the DEP's Division of Air Quality.
She says money for the project comes from the u_s_ e_p_a_'s national clean
diesel campaign
which supports projects aimed at reducing diesel exhaust.
>>RENU CHAKRABARTY: When we got this latest influx of
funding we started looking around for sources and we found out Fayette County
was interested
and so we started talking from there.
>>NARRATION: The program works like this: schools provide matching funds up front to purchase
the new buses.
As for the old buses, they're taken off road forever.
>>RENU CHAKRABARTY: They can't just sell them at auction where they go out someplace and get used for another
couple of decades -
instead, what we have them do is they completely have to demolish
those buses.
>>NARRATION: And demolish they did -
Fayette County chose to scrap four eleven year old buses. >>LEON SHREWSBERRY: They only asked we drill a hole
in the engine, well, they
crushed the engine.
They actually cut the whole body up and shipped it through a shredder.
So it was great to watch that happen. >>NARRATION: But the county didn't come away empty handed.
>>GARRY HOUGH: the impact wasn't horrible on us because
we received recycling money for those materials
which generated about half of what those buses would have sold if we were sold them at auction
and continue to pollute the environment so it that wasn't a negative impact. Normally
after we're through with our buses bus we get anywhere from four to five thousand dollars when
we sell them at auction.
We got two thousand dollars a bus
to to scrap them and
they were kind enough, you know,
we were able to keep
tires and things that weren't -- that didn't have any environmental impact, so really we recovered a
lot more than that. NARRATION: Garry Hough says the grant allowed the school system
to nearly double the number of buses purchased this year -
a significant bonus -
but it's more than just that.
>>GARY HOUGH: It sends a message to our children
that were being environmentally friendly and as teachers and
as educators in our school system we've got to be good examples to the children.
Not only do we need teach them but we have to demonstrate on a daily basis that we're being
environmentally friendly.
>>NARRATION: Fayette County has ninety five school buses in it's fleet,
seventy-five assigned regular runs. Last year, Fayette County buses traveled roughly
one point three
million miles.
In Fayetteville, I'm Mike Huff for Environment Matters.
>>GREG ADOLFSON: Last year, a similar grant helped Greenbrier County replace five school buses.
You've heard the expression cooking with gas - well, there may be a time in the
not-too-distant future West Virginia state vehicles will be driving with gas -
West Virginia natural gas, that is. Last month Governor Earl Ray Tomlin signed an
executive order establishing a natural gas vehicle
task force. The task force will study will study the potential cost savings of converting gasoline
or diesel fueled state vehicles to natural gas and look into what it would take
to develop the infrastructure to support of network of compressed gas fueling stations.
In a release from the governor's office, Governor Tomblin said:
with our state being one of the leading producers of natural gas in the nation
is important for us to explore the feasibility of using this resource to
fuel our states transportation needs
in addition to expanding the market for natural gas
we would lessen our dependence on foreign oil safe taxpayer money and
create new jobs
vehicles that run on natural gas produce less air pollution than conventional
vehicles. Conversion costs vary from vehicle to vehicle.
Right now, natural gas is significantly cheaper
than either gasoline or diesel fuel.
Coming up one community looks to sustainability to improve its quality of life while
helping to revive its struggling economy. BUt first,
did you know that leaving your car in your driveway just twice a week reduces greenhouse gas
emissions by sixteen hundred pounds a year? Take a few minutes once a week to make a list
the all the errands that need to get done and see if you can batch them into one trip.
If you commute to work, ask if you could work from home at least some days. You'll help reduce air
pollution and traffic congestion and save time and money.
We're back in a moment.