UMass Boston

By: Ashanti Mclean ‘26, Office of Campus Planning & Sustainability PACE Intern

October, 2024

Student Perspective: Fossil Fuel-Free Community

Overview

• Sixteen BIPOC students were tasked with creating a hypothetical fossil fuel-free community
• Learned about various renewable energy sources such as solar, geothermal, ocean thermal, and wind energy

I’m a Junior at UMass Boston majoring in Environmental Studies with a double minor in Clean Energy and Philosophy.

Over the summer, beginning on July 15th and ending on the 19th, I had the opportunity to take part in the PATHways Camp program organized by UMass Boston’s School for the Environment and sponsored by NASA, and open to students at other schools, where I and 16 other Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) undergrad students were tasked with an engineering design challenge of creating a fossil fuel-free community. This would be a community of 10,000 people located on a peninsula. It was funny to see how similar the map layout was to our very own campus. There were four sectors that we were able to choose to work on–energy, transportation, circular economy, or housing & heating and cooling. If a participant's interests appeared in more than one of these sectors, they were welcome to dip their toes into whatever speaks to them. My particular interest is in energy, so I was eager to begin brainstorming to find out how to make the most cost-effective yet energy-efficient community. To tackle this challenge, we embarked on a series of statewide adventures to gain a wide range of information and to design our fossil fuel-free communities accurately. 

I’ll take you along on our adventures:

Day 1: Climate Justice & Lessons from Afar     

• Learned about international sustainable practices and the significance of equitability when creating a community         

We began the first day at the Museum of Science where we watched a new Omni show called Cities of the Future. I enjoyed the immersive experience of watching the movie on a spherical screen, capturing angles that you couldn’t find in 2D. We learned about the sustainable practices of diverse cities from Singapore to Amsterdam. It was fascinating learning about the way Singapore transitioned themselves into this well-known garden city. I took a mental note of how this vegetative city came to fruition to determine the feasibility of implementing it in my community. Inspiration also came from my newfound knowledge of Amsterdam’s main source of transportation, which is bikes. A fun fact that caught me off guard was learning that there are more bikes than people in Amsterdam! Immediately, I began to think about setting up the community in a way where everything was within walking or biking distance. Another highlight of the day was being given a firsthand look at a new exhibit called Innovation Earth. One of the displays showed e-glass, which traps thermal radiation during the winter to keep buildings warm and reflects it out during the summer to keep them cool. The “E” stands for emissivity, representing the amount of thermal radiation emitted from the surface.

We ended our day at UMass Boston with guest speakers Prof. Rosalyn Negron, who teaches in the Anthropology department of UMB, and Kerrie Wilkins-Yel, the Assistant Professor of Counseling Psychology at UMB who held a discussion on equity and environmental & climate justice. It’s important to keep in mind the social sphere which is a major component in equitable sustainability. The voices of the public must be met to ensure that the residents are all in agreement with the outcome of the place in which they’d call home.

Day 2: Net Zero Geothermal Building & Windpower

• Visited the Center for Computing & Data Sciences building at BU to learn about its’ Net Zero composition

Looking at the agenda, I was very excited about today because most of the activities were focused entirely on renewable energy! Starting off bright and early at 8:30 AM, we traveled to Boston University to get a tour of their Net Zero building. The Center for Computing & Data Sciences, better known as the “Jenga” building by many students, is a model example of what our future society could look like. Some of its main features include its triple-glazed glass windows for more efficient insulation as well as its geothermal system for heating and cooling. We were given a behind-the-scenes look at the pumps designed to keep the building warm in the winter and cool in the summer. I loved how pristine and organized it all was! Learning about the geothermal makeup of this building sparked the interest of my group members and me in implementing this system into the residential and commercial buildings of our community. Our next location was a wind blade testing facility where we got to see the full-sized length of wind turbine blades, which were absolutely ginormous up close! This led my group and I to consider how much energy a single turbine generates and the benefits and opportunities of offshore wind compared to onshore.

Day 3: Geothermal in Neighborhoods

• Participated in tour and discussion of geothermal pumps placed in low-income communities

We traveled to Framingham to learn about district heating, also known as networked geothermal systems from a nonprofit called the Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET). Their main goal is to cut carbon emissions from low-income communities and provide them with affordable and accessible energy to allow them to live comfortably. It was inspiring to see how the transition to clean renewable energy sources is already being implemented in the homes of those who could benefit from it the most. For the rest of the day with some inspiration, we began working on the content of our projects.

Day 4: Clean Energy at UMB

• Tour of UMB campus to learn how it implements clean sustainable energy practices 

Traveling back to UMass Boston we went on a tour led by Janna Cohen-Rosenthal, the Campus Sustainability & Resiliency Planner of the different energy facilities including our solar canopy above West Garage. With our newly constructed Green Infrastructure & Climate Resilient Quad, I was in awe of how calculated the planning was. Not only is the vegetation responsible for heat reduction, but it also filters contaminants out of stormwater. Along the Harbor Walk is a Saltwater Pump House which I learned was a zero-emission system that uses ocean water to cool the campus through thermal exchange. Going into the basement-level central utility plant and seeing the neverending amount of furnaces and chillers put into perspective the amount of energy that is required to heat and cool large-scale buildings. It reminded me of the complexity of energy systems and the long-term processes that come with transitioning to clean energy.

Day 5: Putting it All Together

The last day has finally come! All of our field trips and group project work led up to this moment where we would finally present the outcome of all we’ve learned. Some major takeaways included the large capacity of energy that comes from wind turbines. As well as how much regional work is already taking place for clean, renewable energy. The outcome of my group’s project consisted of a community with 85% of its energy being produced from 4 offshore wind farms with the remaining 5% from solar panels. To encourage mindfulness among residents about where their energy comes from, they would all be placed in commercial and residential buildings, using geothermal energy as the main heating source. The results of the other teams consisted of sustainable food production and new urbanism housing infrastructure centered around community gardens 

As a society, we are still far from a 100% fossil-free community, however, through our constant efforts both regionally and locally, we’re taking small strides to get to some version of this. I’m a strong believer in doing something as opposed to doing absolutely nothing, so in the face of the climate crisis, it’s programs like this that optimistically remind me to continue to be engaged in building a clean energy future.