Collegiate Times

While I applaud the Beyond Coal organization for making an effort to better the environment, I believe that its goals are unrealistic. It wants to reduce ozone emissions from 80 parts per billion to somewhere between 60 and 70 parts per billion, while the ozone levels around

Blacksburg are currently less than 50 parts per billion per year. But, 80 parts per billion is already an extremely low amount of emissions. To grasp how small it is, think of this analogy: India’s population is roughly one billion people; if 80 people of that population were to become pollutants that would have almost no effect on the population percentage. So, 0.00000008 percent of pollutants are allowed to enter the atmosphere here, and Blacksburg currently emits less than that.

Beyond Coal’s main goal is to have Virginia Tech be powered by means other than coal and it says doing so will lower the cost of tuition. It wants Tech to be powered by geothermal, wind and solar energy. Geothermal energy is being used at the recently renovated Blacksburg Motor Company, a building roughly 4,500 square feet. More than 300 geothermal pipes were placed into the ground at more than 330 feet deep. Just for McBryde Hall, which is roughly 45,000 square feet, more than 3,000 holes will need to be drilled to accommodate for the use of geothermal energy, and that’s just for one building on campus. Where would Tech drill the holes for geothermal use?

It’s not going to tear up the Drillfield to do so, and the cost of implementing geothermal technology would be very expensive. The only reason the Blacksburg Motor Company switched to geothermal was because of government grants, which paid for almost all of it. As for wind energy, a wind turbine more than 150 feet tall will need to be placed on campus to acquire enough energy to even be feasible. Tech is not going to allow something that tall to be built. Tech doesn’t want any building to be more prominent than Burruss Hall. Solar energy is feasible, but what about cloudy days?

Lastly, if Tech were to do this, how would it pay for these changes? Simple, raise tuition rates once again.

Greg Stecher

Senior

Civil engineering major

A version of this article appeared in the Mar 23 issue of the Collegiate Times.