Sustainability is a growing issue in Vermonters’ minds as we gear towards heating season. No one really wants to pay over three dollars on a gallon of heating oil. Luckily some high school and college students have the answer. The Vermont Sustainable Heating Initiative (VSHI) supports the use of locally grown and produced biomass (grass, wood, natural fibers) pellets as a way to affordably heat your home. This could help to sustain Vermont’s heating industry and keep people’s money in the country. VSHI believes that assorted prairie grass to make such pellets could be grown on the approximate 100,000 acres of underutilized agricultural land in Vermont.
In the middle of January 2008, a seed for VSHI was planted at the Governor’s Institutes of Vermont Winter Weekend. A weeklong program with a focus on attacking global climate change from different areas: youth activism, engineering, arts, and mind, body, spirit. It started in the engineering group when leader Tom Tailer suggested a project. Then, it spread like a virus. By the end of the weekend, the group had rounded up over 100 teenagers from about 26 high schools from around the state.
After a few meetings and many logistics to work out, VSHI planned a rally in mid-February of 2008. On that day, the fifty high school students marched from Montpelier High School to the Vermont Statehouse. The night began with a short speech from Mount Abraham Union High School student and VSHI board chair, Jessie-Ruth Corkins. It proceeded with techno dancing on the courthouse steps. The date happened to correspond with an oil hearing hosted by the House Natural Resources and Energy committee. There, the well prepared group astounded politicians and alternative fuel specialists with their vast knowledge and clever strategizing.
This lead to more presentations and tons of contacts from around the world to today, as VSHI has grown and networked like crazy to get support from all sectors of society. Currently, the group has started their own pilot project, formed in order to show that there is a market for pellets in Vermont. Hopefully this will lead to Vermont produced grass pellets. In the pilot project, VSHI is teaming up with the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). Interested LIHEAP applicants in the five town area had the chance to fill out a program application. Then, their home was checked to see if it was possible to put a stove in. As money rolled into VSHI’s account, they purchased wood burning pellet stoves from Home Depot. With the assistance of an experienced professional, VSHI members have already installed three stoves and two others ready to go in.
To fund such a project, VSHI has established a carbon offset program. For $12, one ton of the carbon you have admitted is offset. Unlike other carbon offset programs, VSHI’s is completely transparent, meaning all of your money goes straight to the pilot program. For more information, visit their website www.sustainableheatingvt.org or talk to Tom Tailer at Mount Abraham Union High School.
Any way you decide in supporting our sustainable future, whether through buying carbon offsets, joining VSHI, or just buying a pellet stove yourself, what you are doing is helping. Anything people can do will help make sure our earth is healthy forever. VSHI is helping this feat by finding a renewable and better to keep your house heated this winter. As prominent VSHI member Courtney Devoid said, “We are giving people hope that they will be able to stay warm in the immediate future and for many years to come.”
In the middle of January 2008, a seed for VSHI was planted at the Governor’s Institutes of Vermont Winter Weekend. A weeklong program with a focus on attacking global climate change from different areas: youth activism, engineering, arts, and mind, body, spirit. It started in the engineering group when leader Tom Tailer suggested a project. Then, it spread like a virus. By the end of the weekend, the group had rounded up over 100 teenagers from about 26 high schools from around the state.
After a few meetings and many logistics to work out, VSHI planned a rally in mid-February of 2008. On that day, the fifty high school students marched from Montpelier High School to the Vermont Statehouse. The night began with a short speech from Mount Abraham Union High School student and VSHI board chair, Jessie-Ruth Corkins. It proceeded with techno dancing on the courthouse steps. The date happened to correspond with an oil hearing hosted by the House Natural Resources and Energy committee. There, the well prepared group astounded politicians and alternative fuel specialists with their vast knowledge and clever strategizing.
This lead to more presentations and tons of contacts from around the world to today, as VSHI has grown and networked like crazy to get support from all sectors of society. Currently, the group has started their own pilot project, formed in order to show that there is a market for pellets in Vermont. Hopefully this will lead to Vermont produced grass pellets. In the pilot project, VSHI is teaming up with the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). Interested LIHEAP applicants in the five town area had the chance to fill out a program application. Then, their home was checked to see if it was possible to put a stove in. As money rolled into VSHI’s account, they purchased wood burning pellet stoves from Home Depot. With the assistance of an experienced professional, VSHI members have already installed three stoves and two others ready to go in.
To fund such a project, VSHI has established a carbon offset program. For $12, one ton of the carbon you have admitted is offset. Unlike other carbon offset programs, VSHI’s is completely transparent, meaning all of your money goes straight to the pilot program. For more information, visit their website www.sustainableheatingvt.org or talk to Tom Tailer at Mount Abraham Union High School.
Any way you decide in supporting our sustainable future, whether through buying carbon offsets, joining VSHI, or just buying a pellet stove yourself, what you are doing is helping. Anything people can do will help make sure our earth is healthy forever. VSHI is helping this feat by finding a renewable and better to keep your house heated this winter. As prominent VSHI member Courtney Devoid said, “We are giving people hope that they will be able to stay warm in the immediate future and for many years to come.”
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