Cohousing-L Mailing List: Thank you! Sustainability

[Ruth J Hirsch (heidinys]

Many many thanks, Ken and Trudy for your detained informative letters.  I’ll be 
bring them to our Community Living Committee.

I am intentionally including them below as they may be useful to others.

 May the coming time be filled with 
your hearts desire----- with moments of joy, delight, and peace.   And vibrant 
good health.  
And may goodness ripple out around the world.
  Ruth 


Date: Tue, 10 Dec 2024 11:28:10 -0500
From: Ken Winter <kenatsun [at] gmail.com <mailto:kenatsun [at] gmail.com>>
Subject: Re: [C-L]_ Sustainability committee

At Sunward Cohousing we've had something called the SunZero initiative
going since 2020.  Our mission statement is:

To mitigate human-caused global climate disruption by initiating, funding,
and managing projects that enable Sunward Cohousing and its residents to
achieve zero carbon emissions as rapidly as possible.

Here are a couple of project overview documents that have some useful
tidbits for other communities initiating such projects:

  - The SunZero Initiative
  
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1e2EuwCSzQXBhM8HvNsdKnrglLmE1At12hdDfSB5HX7k/edit?usp=sharing>
  ? a prospectus for the whole initiative, written when the initiative was
  just getting started
  - Project Prioritization in the Real World
  
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yd_4QD0KDghD2nd1rTYgMuLyOIkc6G5vPAsHi9-N5Jg/edit?usp=sharing>
  ? lessons learned from how the initiative has actually worked out, so far

In those docs, you'll find references to "the Ed Fund".  Ed, one of our
members, died in early 2020 and left Sunward a substantial bequest,
earmarked for projects that serve the SunZero mission.  The Ed Fund has
paid for an energy audit, solar panels on our common house, and four EV
chargers in our parking area.  We have organized our bookkeeping so that
the "profits" from these systems are funneled into the SunZero account,
where they will be available (and earmarked) to finance more SunZero
projects.  Your community's sustainability efforts, of course, may not
receive a financial windfall like this.  But in managing the Ed Fund, we've
come up with some organizational arrangements that could be useful in
organizing a "sustainability fund" that could be actively fund-raised.
Depending on how the SunZero initiative develops, we may solicit donations
and bequests to the Ed Fund in the future.

We also have projects going that don't draw on the Ed Fund.  The biggest
one right now is the heat pumps project ? a high priority because almost
half of our homes are still heated by their original-equipment, 26-year-old
gas furnaces.  It's heart-breaking whenever one of those dies and gets
replaced by another gas-burner, because that's another 20-year investment
in the fossil-fuel industry.  So we're scrambling to research the heat pump
options, track the available subsidies, get and evaluate contractor
proposals, and see if we can get group-buy discounts.

Another project that's trying to get born here is car-sharing.  Any
community interested in this should plug into the Cohousing Car Share
Group, organized by Janet Murphy of Arboretum Cohousing in Madison, WI.
Its organizing hub is a google group. Go to
https://groups.google.com/g/coho-carshare/about for instructions about how
to join.

I'm happy to share our experiences with particular projects and issues with
anyone who might find that useful.

~ Hope this helps
~ Ken Winter (Sunward Cohousing, Ann Arbor MI)
——————————————————————————
Date: Mon, 9 Dec 2024 14:19:12 -0500
From: Trudy Macdonald <trumac [at] verizon.net>
Subject: [C-L]_ Sustainability committee


Hello Ruth, 

Here at Bay State Cohousing we have an Eco Committee that was established long 
before we moved in.  
Our Mandate and Charges:  To research ways to make our building a model of 
environmental sustainability.  We will explore all possible ways to reduce our 
use of fossil fuels and reduce our carbon footprint.  We will utilize all 
incentives available to reduce cost both in the short and long term. 

Since moving in, in Nov. 2022, we continue to meet monthly to explore ways to 
keep our community sustainable by reducing, reusing, recycling and composting.  
We confer with other committees, such as  meals task force, Common Spaces, 
Landscape and Gardening and Building and Maintenance committees.

We are spearheading the Solar Project and are in the process of installing 
solar panels on our roof.  We have a compost vendor to pick up our food waste 
and use composters on site for our yard waste.  We have volunteers who take all 
of our recyclable materials to the Dept. of Public Works on a biweekly bases.  
We use rain barrels to water our gardens.  We use bamboo toilet paper and paper 
towels.  We are exploring the most cost effective way of installing electric 
chargers for our 3 electric cars.   We encourage the use of eco friendly 
cleaning products and reducing the use of single use plastics by getting 
refills on products such as detergents, shampoos etc.  Our heating and cooling 
systems are all electric.  

We keep the community aware of local, city and state climate initiatives and 
encourage advocacy when needed.   

Let me know if you need further information and give me a call if you would 
like to chat.  

Best regards, 

Trudy Macdonald
Bay State Cohousing