This past Monday, legislators in the Maryland Senate voted to approve Senate Bill 278, which commits the state to a 25 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from 2006 levels by the year 2020.
Hopkins has already been making headway toward reducing its greenhouse gas emissions, and administrators believe that the reduction will be achieved ahead of the proposed deadline.
SB 278, the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reduction Act of 2009, is in agreement with the gas reduction goals set by the Maryland Commission on Climate Change. It is now moving to the Maryland House of Delegates.
The bill mandates that "on or before Dec. 31, 2012," the Department of the Environment will adopt a final plan "to reduce statewide greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent from 2006 levels by 2020."
In 2007, Dr. William Brody implemented the Hopkins Task Force on Climate Change with the mission of reducing greenhouse gases on campus.
The Task Force, headed by Professor Benjamin Hobbs of the Department of Geography Environmental Engineering, remains confident of the University's success should the bill's mandates be approved.
"According to the Climate Change Task Force's recommendations to the President, we recommend that a 50 percent reduction be achieved by 2025, and we believe that these reductions are feasible and economic. The figure in our summary shows that we would achieve the 25 percent goal by 2020 by a wide margin," Hobbs wrote in an e-mail to the News-Letter.
"I believe that the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative is a useful demonstration of the concept of carbon trading, and represents important state leadership that will, I hope, result in more effective federal legislation," Hobbs wrote.
Numerous Hopkins student groups also showed support for the bill and are helping the Task Force meet its goals of greenhouse gas reduction.
One of these groups, the Sustainable Hopkins Infrastructure Program (SHIP), is a student wing of the Task Force.
"The mission of SHIP is to reduce carbon emissions through implementation of various programs and we support the new bill to further that goal," sophomore Dan Teran, the student director of SHIP, said.
SHIP has been active, in concert with other environmental groups, in helping to reduce the University's carbon footprint.
"We have different projects and proposals and we evaluate what we can do. We actually do many small projects that make a big difference," Teran said.
The Hopkins Energy Action Team (HEAT) is another group dedicated to reducing carbon emissions. Its members are likewise enthusiastic about the Act.
"If passed the bill would have a great effect on the state of Maryland, but for Hopkins the Climate Change Task Force recommendations, the adopting of which we are urging the new President Daniels to take on as one of his main goals in office, would put the Hopkins institutions above the proposed levels," Julia Blocher, a junior and the leader of HEAT, wrote in an e-mail to the News-Letter.
HEAT is currently trying to encourage President Daniels to implement the Task Force's proposed recommendations.
"Right now we're mostly focused on the Task Force recommendations - our members sit on the three working groups as student advisers - but we also are involved in Sustainable Hopkins Infrastructure Program (SHIP) and just attended a conference on sustainability and climate change called Power Shift," Blocher wrote.
Some have worried about the cost of the Task Force's proposals.
"The Task Force believes that the near-term measures to lower our energy use will pay for themselves quickly, and so will actually free up financial resources (by lowering energy bills) for the rest of the University. To reduce carbon emissions (net) by 100 percent would, however, cost several millions of dollars per year," Hobbs wrote.
Blocher said Hopkins would likely lead in "green" initiatives.
"Hopkins should take a leadership role on sustainability, because ultimately, legislation will follow what the public wants and universities have historically been a gauge for the level of progress that should be occurring in the U.S.," Blocher wrote.
