August 21, 2024

Attendance: Alex Kinsella, Liz Maloney, Sebastien Bigorre, Lanie Plueddemann, Carolina Camargo,
Dave Derosier, Alan Gaul, Kai Srisirikul

#1 Beach cleanups (first Thursday of the month at noon)
• August cleanup had a great turnout!
• Lanie will lead September 5
• Alan will lead Oct 3
• Facilities will get latex gloves for future cleanups

#2 Lunch and Learns
• Seb talked to Dr. Kumara, who could do a Lunch and Learn in October about nutrition. He
has recently written a book on this topic.
• Reach out to HR wellness program? It would be in line with the activities that they
tend to support.
• If that happens in October, next Lunch and Learn would be in the winter, maybe January
• Idea for LnL: Stephanie Madsen on sustainability initiatives going on in Falmouth
• Liz will reach out
• Idea for LnL: Mark Kasprzyk, conservation director for Falmouth
• Idea for LnL: Megan Amsler on winterizing/energy efficient appliances
• Alex will reach out
• Should we coordinate with other science institutions in Woods Hole for Lunch n Learns,
etc?
• Matt Person at MBL library has contacts
• Janet Fields might have contacts
• Before, we partnered with Steamship Authority for a successful bike path cleanup.
Could we do something similar to that again?

#3 Garden updates
• The STF garden is looking great! Lots of weeds but also lots of tomatoes.
• Several plots in the village garden are looking uncared for. An email reminder was sent out
and the plots will be turned over if they aren’t tended to.
• Alan would like to make a student garden at Oyster Pond. There will be a build day
tentatively on Sep 10 where they will construct raised bed structures.

#4 Energy Master Plan updates
• Dave Derosier gave us an energy update:
• The EMP presentation to the board was spread throughout the slides, since the
amount of time allocated to it got cut down substantially. The board wants to hear
that we are making progress on both GHG reduction and price reduction, which we
are.
• Gas-fired heating is cheaper than heat pumps in the winter. But heat pumps are
cheaper for cooling in the summer.
• Energy budget went down from 20kWh to 18kWh despite adding 4 new buildings, so
energy efficiency programs are working.
• The central plant is the big ticket item of GHG reduction: it is 50% of our usage and
is responsible for 5 large buildings. The EMP recommendations for decarbonizing
the central plant don’t make economic sense for us because the system still has a long
lifetime left. The best way to spend money is to replace old buildings and make them
more efficient.
• Upcoming upgrades in Clark will electrify parts of it and improve windows,
insulations, etc. There are plans to upgrade Clark 5, the lobby, and one wing.
• Upgraded air handling in LOSOS
• The Dock/Iselin project will be an energy upgrade, because Iselin (gas-fired) will be
torn down and replaced with an electrified building.
• We are most of the way to funding for solar on the David Center
• A large car port with solar would be great. The most likely location would be the
David Center lot.
• Will geothermal work for the dock? Still under consideration.

#5 Yard sale idea
• Seb, Liz, and Alex were talking about the possibility of a WHOI yard sale event for labs to
get rid of old items. We are investigating what’s allowed: e.g. can we sell items we no longer
need?
• Dave: Institution is starting an initiative to look into storage issues. Reducing the amount of
clutter is much preferred to building new space to house it. He can this get idea thrown into
that committee.
• Places to give stuff away: Falmouth Service Center, Falmouth School Department.

#6 Other ideas/discussion
• Add more projects to the website that we’ve accomplished over the last few years. We could
show off more of our GHG reduction efforts.
• Perennial truth: reducing consumption is more effective than increasing efficiency! (But
both are essential.)

Our next meeting is Wednesday, September 18th at 1 pm