Pitch
MIT Steam Tunnel Society engages all members of the community: alumni, students, staff, and faculty as we rethink a sustainable campus.
Description
Summary
Create the MIT Steam Tunnel Society as an engaging fundraising platform to finance the renewal of MIT's campus. The Steam Tunnel Society will engage all members of the community from alumni, to students, to staff as we rethink a sustainable campus. Membership in the Steam Tunnel Society for donors to MIT's infrastructure renewal campaign. Top donors will receive naming rights for the new nuclear reactor which will replace MIT's co-generation facility. MIT's steam distribution system will be upgraded new loops of hot and chilled water. Buildings will be retrofitted where practical or torn down and replaced with Net Zero structures (good bye Walker Memorial), topped with solar panels. Distributed energy recovery ventilation systems with variable speed drives controlled by CO2 sensors will assure fresh air in all buildings as needed. Detailed power consumption measured at the circuit level will be published in an open MIT community portal, enabling research on consumption behavior, feedback mechanisms, conservation measures.
What actions do you propose?
MIT alumni will participate in the conversion of the MIT campus into a living laboratory for researching ways to build and operate a campus in the 21'st century. Donors will be inducted into the Steam Tunnel Society and be treated to tours of MIT's latest facilities and invited to lectures by MIT's energy researchers. Alumni will learn how to advocate for changes in local building codes which are needed to shift away from carbon-intensive construction. MIT food services will participate in the process, working with experts from Food and Nutrition and conducting research on students and staff to better understand how to encourage their patrons to prefer a lower carbon footprint menu.
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