Mount Si’s green team saves money and the environment
February 24, 2010
By Laura Geggel
NEW — 6:00 a.m. Feb. 24, 2010
Mount Si High School recycles paper and plastics, but it has a way to go on other environmental fronts, at least according to the Green Team.
For starters, the school could allow students to compost their leftover lunch food, senior Colin VanSlyke said.
The school could also have reusable plates, instead of Styrofoam ones, which clog landfills, senior Craig Hauser added.
Mount Si 2009 graduate Daisy Frearson started the Green Team last year, encouraging students to care for the environment.
They went on fieldtrips across Meadowbrook Way Southeast, picking up trash in the swamp, now next to the tennis courts.
This year, the Green Team is on their way to achieving new goals.
“I think it’s about doing research and finding out ways we can save money for the school,” VanSlyke said.
The team is already working with Cedar Grove Composting, which picks up compost from Snoqualmie Casino. Cedar Grove administrators said they would look into adding Mount Si High School to their pickup list, and in the meantime, invited the students to tour their facility, VanSlyke said.
Student engagement
The Green Team is busy educating their peers about the environment. They invited Engineering Economics branch manager Jeff Nichols to speak about the school’s new geothermal system after school Feb. 10. Before an audience of 20 students and teachers, Nichols explained how pipes would use ground water to help heat and cool the school.
The system would save about $300,000 per year and reduce annual energy usage by 75 percent, Nichols said. Plus, it could grow along with the high school.
“It sounds interesting. It could help the school a lot,” junior Emery Swain said.
She and junior Stephanie Rehm noted the current heating, ventilation and air-conditioning system doesn’t connect with the choir room, making it sweltering in the summer and freezing in the winter.
“If you don’t have a jacket, you’re sitting there shivering,” Swain said.
By attending the geothermal presentation, she and her friends learned the new HVAC system would completely replace the old system, meaning the choir room would have a more stable temperature after the system’s completion this fall.
Nichols answered student questions about the geothermal unit — yes, it would be operational during most floods and yes, it would have a backup boiler in case the unit failed for some reason — and then took them outside to show them the construction scene.
The Green Team’s next guest, Doug Smith, serves on the United Nations Environmental Committee and has worked for the Environmental Protection Agency for more than 30 years.
Though Smith’s presentation on climate change needs to be authorized by the high school’s Controversial Issues Committee, Green Team advisor science teacher Andrew Rapin said the talk would probably take place during Earth Week in April.
Laura Geggel: 392-6434, ext. 221, or lgeggel@snovalleystar.com.
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