Tuesday May 22, 2007

Hingham Green Energy Action Committee meeting minutes.

Present: John Tzimorangas, Russ Heissner, Brian Phillips, Pam Harty, Ted Alexiades.

Absent: David Killory, Rob Baynes

Minutes of last meeting was not voted upon. Will vote at next meeting scheduled for June 12^th 7:00 PM

Agenda:

1. Develop short and long term recommendations that will be used to update the Selectmen at the next scheduled meeting on June 5^th. The recommendations will be made for consideration and after feedback from the selectmen, formal recommendations will be made at a TBD future Selectman’s Meeting.

The following recommendations were discussed for consideration and were and unanimously voted upon for approval:

• That the Town of Hingham hire a consulting firm to perform a Carbon Footprint benchmarking study of energy and greenhouse gas sources and uses for the Town of Hingham. The study is to be used to establish the current baseline metric, and then to establish specific programs to achieve an overall reduction (target TBD) of carbon footprint moving forward.

• That the Town of Hingham formally adopt a Carbon Footprint Action Plan that will be developed by the Energy Policy committee. The plan will be based largely upon a similar action plan developed and implemented by the City of Newton, MA.

• That the Town of Hingham formally adopts LEED energy efficiency certification standards for all new municipal buildings and projects.

• That the Town of Hingham provides LEED energy efficiency certification standard guidelines for private developers, and that the Town of Hingham actively encourages the voluntary use of these guidelines by private developers for all new building projects.

• That the Town of Hingham adopt a policy whereby the Hingham Municipal Lighting Plant maintains the current percentage or increases the percentage of renewable energy in its total power purchasing portfolio.

• That the Town of Hingham formally adopt a long term power development strategy of Distributed Power Generation from sources such as micro turbines, solar power, cogeneration, and large wind turbines for use in municipal, commercial, and residential applications.

• That the Town of Hingham immediately replace diesel fuel with bio-diesel (that meets the appropriate ASTM standards) for all town owned diesel powered transportation vehicles and back-up power generators.

• That the Town of Hingham immediately mandates a goal to increase average fuel economy by 50% for the town owned vehicle fleet.

• That the Town of Hingham immediately mandates a goal to increase the amount of recycling by 2x of current levels at the town transfer facility.

The next posted meeting will take place during the Selectman’s meeting on June 5^th. Russ Heissner will make arrangements to be put on the agenda.

The next scheduled Energy Committee meeting will take place on June 12^th. The agenda will be to make any necessary amendments to the above recommendations based upon feedback from the Selectmen, and to incorporate them for formal consideration by the Selectman at the next available meeting.