2008-01-23 Cities for Climate Protection Minutes

Home Browse Search

January 23, 2008 Reading Advisory Committee on Cities for Climate Protection Program Committee Notes for January 23, 2008 (Next Meeting - February 6"' at Town Hall) Committee Meeting 7:00 PM, present were Gina Snyder, Ron D'Addario, Joan Boegel, Michele Benson, Ray Porter, Tracy Sopchak, Sophie Gellot and Stephanie Anderberg. Welcome - Chair Michele Benson opened the meeting, welcoming all present. Minutes - A motion was made and to approve the minutes from the January 9th next meeting. Minutes were approved unanimously. World Cafe - the World Cafe event is on February 27`h, which is a meeting night for ACCCP. Instead of the climate meeting, committee members should attend the World Cafe. The format includes table discussions, so committee members should plan to sit at different tables, to help facilitate discussions. Meeting with Peter (Update) - Tracy told the committee that at the most recent meeting with Peter, 8 Action Plan items were presented for his review. She made some edits based on his comments, but in general, he approved of the items. He has been very good about giving the Action Plan subcommittee time out of his schedule to go over items, and is generally positive about our suggested Actions. Three Action items remain to be prepared by the subcommittee and reviewed by Peter. PowerPoint for presentation to Board of Selectmen - The goal of the presentation is to is to give the Selectmen an update on the committee's progress, and let them know we've completed milestone 3. We also need buy-in on the goal of 10% reduction in GHG emissions over baseline. How do we ask them to agree with the goals? One idea is to give them an idea of where the goals came from - use as a benchmark the Kyoto and RGGI & president's numbers varying from 10 to 20%. The continuing issue is how we count emissions from VMT, as most of the data used to set our baseline was cut through traffic. All of our interventions can be aimed at residents and commuters to Reading, but we can't affect the behavior of through-travelers, so our efforts may not show up in the next VMT studies. The committee discussed several edits and re-ordering suggestions for the draft PowerPoint slides. Recycling Update - Sophie has had difficulty reaching the suggested teachers at Eaton & Wood End. The Recycling committee has completed its website but it's not yet published. (looks nice) The website will act as a supplemental source of information to what is one the DPW site - not to repeat what `s on there, but to give information about recycling options and items not listed on the municipal site. Sophie will get Action Items info to Gina, for inclusion in next meeting with Peter. Gina will format it to match other Items. Other Business - regarding the Earth Day event, the committee agreed that it would be great to have the electronics collection container on-site, and asked Sophie to contact the recycling company and coordinate this element of the event. We may need more logistics on staffing the collection site and collecting the fees (which are only for a few of the many items to be collected). Ron visited the LEED platinum house in Lawrence that had been featured in The Globe. The house included such green features as: bamboo flooring, recycled wood, a 40 year roof, connections ready for solar water & water heater, R27 insulation. The plumbing is set up for grey water collection for toilet flush. Passive solar is through large windows. There is a heat exchanger for air intake. This was a modular home, made offsite, and assembled in one day. Projections indicate an expected 30% (approx) savings in heating & cooling costs. There are approximately 15 LEED platinum houses in the country to date.