REASONS AND GOALS

Installing a wind turbine atop the Snow Bowl achieves a multiplicity of goals:

1. Supports carbon neutrality initiative: By reducing the College's net carbon emissions, this project contributes to future Environmental Council proposals to minimize the College community's greenhouse gas emissions. Based on the Snow Bowl’s current yearly energy use (of 450,000 kWh/yr), we could prevent 628,650 lbs of CO2. It would take almost 1000 trees to absorb that amount of CO2.

2. Enhance educational opportunities: A wind turbine located atop the Snow Bowl would be fully accessible to the community at large. Most importantly, this project allows us to see where our power comes from and prevents us from displacing our ecological footprint.

3. Increase College’s marketability: Installing a wind turbine at the Snow Bowl makes Middlebury more competitive in the college marketplace as few other schools can claim to have such a direct investment in renewable energy.

4. Finally, this project fully supports the College’s Environmental Peak of Excellence.