{"id":29555,"date":"2025-02-27T13:04:15","date_gmt":"2025-02-27T18:04:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/?p=29555"},"modified":"2025-03-04T12:35:21","modified_gmt":"2025-03-04T17:35:21","slug":"refining-the-strategies-for-meeting-our-climate-goals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/2025\/02\/27\/refining-the-strategies-for-meeting-our-climate-goals\/","title":{"rendered":"Refining the Strategies for Meeting our Climate Goals"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cBuilding decarbonization,\u201d<\/strong> is a wonky term that you are going to hear our team talk a lot about, especially over the next several months. It is the process of reducing emissions associated with a building\u2019s energy use that includes but goes beyond energy efficiency as it focuses on a just transition away from fossil fuels for heating buildings.<\/p>\n

Boston University has made good progress toward its climate goals. The Climate Action Plan<\/a> (CAP) sets ambitious ones, including a target to achieve net zero direct emissions by 2040, a commitment to making BU\u2019s campuses more climate resilient, and reducing emissions associated with constructing buildings. Since BU\u2019s Board of Trustees approved this plan in 2017, we have made significant progress, reducing emissions by 65% compared to our 2006 baseline. The biggest component to these decreased emissions is BU Wind<\/a>, a 48.6-megawatt wind farm in South Dakota, which matches 100% of the University\u2019s electricity needs with renewable energy and reduces the University\u2019s emissions by 53%. We have also built Boston\u2019s largest fossil fuel-free building, the Duan Family Center for Computing & Data Sciences<\/a>, added rooftop solar<\/a> on campus, have begun to electrify <\/a>campus fleet vehicles and expanded EV charging on campus, and launched a comprehensive Zero Waste Plan<\/a> to help divert materials away from landfills and incinerators.<\/p>\n

Of the remaining emissions we have left to get to net zero direct emissions, 98% come from the emissions associated with heating and cooling buildings on campus. Now we are focused on the task of developing and exploring strategies necessary to reduce emissions associated with heating and cooling our buildings.<\/p>\n

So, what is next? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Last month, BU convened the first meeting of the CAP 1.2 working group. Over the next several months, this group will identify strategies and tactics to help decarbonize our existing buildings, like what we are about to embark on with air source heat pumps at the soon-to-be net zero Warren Towers<\/a>. As we did when we developed the Climate Action Plan in 2017, we will engage our community for ideas and feedback, and later this year, we plan to hold community forums on each campus as we develop the recommendations.<\/p>\n

I am excited to co-chair this working group with my friend and colleague Bill Walter, the Associate Vice President for Facilities Management & Operations, and work with an amazing team of operations, engineering, sustainability, and finance professionals, along with faculty and students. This work will rely on the expertise of our team as we explore ways to cut emissions from both existing buildings and future projects. More to come!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cBuilding decarbonization,\u201d is a wonky term that you are going to hear our team talk a lot about, especially over the next several months.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21414,"featured_media":29556,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[116,8,118],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29555"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21414"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29555"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29555\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29558,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29555\/revisions\/29558"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sustainability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}