Awards
Ceremony April 27
Winners of the 2013 Sustainable Santa Fe Awards were announced at the April 10,
City Council meeting. The awards will be given to the recipients at a public
ceremony on Saturday, April 27, at 6 p.m. at the Eldorado Hotel’s gallery space.
The event is open to the public and everyone is encouraged to come celebrate
this year’s winners and to meet and learn more about the winning projects.
The winners and a
brief project description follow:
Community Outreach
Award: Solarize the Roundhouse
A group of Climate
Master’s students collaborated on this project as part of the program and named
their group “Got Sol?” The goal of the project is to install solar panels at the
New Mexico’s State Capitol. Senator Peter Wirth submitted a capital outlay
request for $250,000 to fund the design and installation and the 2013 New Mexico
Legislature allocated $185,000 to the
project.
Environmental
Advocacy Award: Citizens Climate Lobby
The
Santa Fe Citizens Climate Lobby (SFCCL) is part of a network of over 90 citizen
chapters across the U.S. and Canada established to create the
political will for a stable climate. SFCCL has mobilized dozens of its members
to take on an array of tasks from speaking to the media and before public
groups, to letter-writing and lobbying.
Environmental
Justice Award: 2012 Traditional Agriculture and Sustainable Living
Conference
The 2012
Traditional Agriculture and Sustainable Living Conference, organized by a
partnership of organizations including the Pueblo of Tesuque, Four Bridges
Traveling Permaculture Institute, and Sostenga at Northern New Mexico College,
brought awareness to the threat of genetically modified seeds and foods to the
indigenous values and practices of native peoples. Featured 2012 keynote
speakers were Paul Stamets and Oscar Olivera.
Food System Award:
Gaia Gardens
Gaia
Gardens is an
urban neighborhood farm
dedicated to modeling and teaching urban farming, that incorporates
sustainability and permaculture practices through workshops
and field trips for neighborhood schools, non-profit youth organizations, and
homeless organizations on gardening, soil
preparation techniques, food preservation, herbal medicine and water
harvesting.
Water Conservation
Award: Santa Fe Public School’s Water Conservation
Program
The Santa Fe Public
Schools launched a project to conserve water by, among other things, installing
.5-gallon per minute aerators on all hand washing sinks, requiring 1.28 gallon
flush toilets and .5-gallon flush urinals in all remodels and new builds,
tightening its irrigation schedules, installing “smart” water meters on their
top users to detect leaks quickly. These efforts resulted in a 6,846,389-gallon
reduction in water use in Fiscal Year 2012.
Renewable
Energy/Energy Efficiency Award: Sol Not Coal
Installations
Sol Not Coal is a
public education and awareness campaign engaging residents and businesses around
the economic, health, and environmental benefits of solar power. Installations
in 2012 included solar panels on a Santa Fe Fire Station #3 on Cerrillos Road
and the Taytsugeh Oweengeh Intergenerational Center at the Tesuque
Pueblo.
Affordable Green
Building Award: Piñon Ridge Homewise 39 Home Housing
Development
The
homes at Piñon Ridge were constructed to exceed the green building codes and
standards required by the City of Santa Fe, achieving the Build Green New Mexico
Gold rating. Each home incorporates environmentally beneficial features,
resulting in a 40 percent decrease in the demand for water and energy compared
to a house built by standard code.
Green Building
Award: 205 West Cordova Road House
This home
exemplifies the integrated and thoughtful use of leading building science
practices. This degree of green building excellence was achieved at a remarkably
low building cost, demonstrating that efficient and low-impact construction can
be available to the most cost-conscious homebuyer. It achieved a home energy
rating score of 52 without the use of solar equipment, includes many water
saving features, uses numerous sustainable materials and was certified under the
EPA Indoor AirPlus program.
Climate Adaptation
Award: Rocky Mountain Survivor Queen Bee Cooperative
The Rocky Mountain
Survivor Queen Bee Cooperative promotes survivor cross-stock queen bee breeding
through chemical-free management, conscientious production, and professional
development through in-service trainings, workshops and conferences. Bee-keeping
methodologies have been developed to promote breeding and production for the
region founded on living laboratory observations.
Green Economic
Development Award: Green Lodging Initiative
The Green Lodging
Initiative helps the Santa Fe lodging industry to decrease water consumption,
decrease toxic waste disposal, and reduce carbon emissions. The program is
designed to support the lodging industry’s shift to different, healthier systems
and products.
Low Carbon
Transportation Award: Linograt ChargePoint Charge
Station
Linograt LLC
provided the first permanent, public access, plug-in vehicle charging station at
a solar offset commercial location in the state. It uses a ChargePoint networked
dual output charging station and is available to the public to provide daytime
charging to top off battery-charge for electric vehicles while in town. Since
its launch in June 2012, the charging station has provided 950 kilowatt hours of
energy to plug-in vehicles saving 2,970 pounds of greenhouse gas
emissions.
Waste Reduction
Award: Water Buffalo
The Water Buffalo
project is a portable water-filtration and chilling unit designed to be paired
with reusable or compostable cups and to avoid the carbon footprint associated
with manufacturing and distributing single-use water bottles. The Water Buffalo
was used at both the Food Depot Souper Bowl and the Santa Fe International Folk
Art Market.
Green Journalism
Award: Occupy New Mexico’s Website and Social Media
The
website www.OccupyNewMexico.org
(ONM) has provided independent journalistic coverage on the Occupy
movements in New Mexico and on related movements for social and environmental
justice. ONM uses video journalism from events as well as aggregation of
grassroots and mainstream news sources. ONM uses social media to spread the word
about the issues it covers.
Youth-Led Award:
Institute of American Indian Arts Student Sustainability
Group
The
Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) Student Sustainability Leadership (SSL)
held The Art of Change: Climate Justice and Indigenous Solutions conference that
focused on culture and stories, creative communication, skills and technology
and tools for change. The SSL also conducted a trash audit and displayed a
week’s worth of trash during a Dumpster Warriors Trash Bash and Fashion show to
raise awareness about waste reduction and recycling.
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