Episode 35: The Eco Performance Office with Ron Herbst

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Ron Herbst, Vice President, Brailsford & Dunlavey, Inc.

Ron Herbst, Vice President, Brailsford & Dunlavey, Inc.

Guests:
Ron Herbst
Vice President, Brailsford & Dunlavey, Inc.

Host: Dave Karlsgodt
Director of Management Advisory Services, Brailsford & Dunlavey, Inc.

What can a higher education institution learn from an international bank? In this episode, we talk to Brailsford & Dunlavey’s own Ron Herbst, whose long and varied career in energy eventually led him to work with Deutsche Bank establishing and managing their Eco Performance Management Office (PMO.) An EcoPMO is a team that coordinates all of the functions needed to achieve an organization’s sustainability goals.

As the son of a blue-collar inventor, Ron felt drawn to the energy and sustainability world from a young age and wanted to be what he calls a “building energy efficiency doctor.”

Ron discusses his time at Deutsche with Dave how he applies what he learned about balancing institutional needs with sustainability goals to colleges and universities. In addition, we also discuss how to balance the needs of various institution stakeholders in order to reach those goals.

Resources:

  • The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE): https://www.aashe.org/

  • US Department of Energy - Better Buildings Partnership: https://betterbuildingssolutioncenter.energy.gov/challenge

  • Second Nature: https://secondnature.org/

  • Rocky Mountain Institute: https://rmi.org/our-work/buildings/

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Episode Transcript:

The following is an automated transcription of this episode which will include errors and omissions. You can listen and follow along with the text here:

https://otter.ai/s/-Tws0LiGQMuAtEwbq6YoKA

You can find a text-only version of the transcript here: Episode 35 Transcript

Episode 34: GeoMicroDistrict: an alternative future for Natural Gas - HEET

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Zeyneb Magavi, Co-Executive Director of HEET and Audrey Schulman, Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director of HEET

Zeyneb Magavi, Co-Executive Director of HEET and Audrey Schulman, Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director of HEET

Guests:
Zeyneb Magavi
Co-Executive Director, HEET

Audrey Schulman
Co-founder and Co-Executive Director, HEET

Host: Dave Karlsgodt
Director of Management Advisory Services, Brailsford & Dunlavey, Inc.

Co-executive directors of the Home Energy Efficiency Team (HEET), Zeyneb Magavi and Audrey Schulman both entered the climate change fight as mothers concerned for the futures of their children. In this episode, they share the history of their work on fixing super-emitting natural gas leaks in their neighborhood and across the state of Massachusetts. They tell the story of building relationships with natural gas utility executives to make a meaningful reduction in GHG emissions which led to the next major challenge: What is the future of a natural gas systemin a world that needs to eliminate the use of fossil fuels? We discuss HEET’s role in developing the GeoMicroDistrict, a neighborhood-scale renewable energy network for heating and cooling buildings. They explain the technology but also how its alternative business model offers a cost-effective path forward for our utility companies and their workers as we replace our aging natural gas infrastructure.

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Episode Transcript:

The following is an automated transcription of this episode which will include errors and omissions. You can listen and follow along with the text here:

https://otter.ai/s/-Tws0LiGQMuAtEwbq6YoKA

You can find a text-only version of the transcript here: Episode 34 Transcript

Episode 28: Twenty Years of Sustainability with Anne Eskridge at the University of Washington

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Anne Eskridge, Director of Transportation Services, University of Washington

Anne Eskridge, Director of Transportation Services, University of Washington

Guests:

Anne Eskridge
Director of Transportation Services, University of Washington

Host:

Dave Karlsgodt
Principal, Fovea, LLC

If you travel by car to visit the University of Washington, your transportation choice will be a minority of those on campus. About 81 percent of the university community travels by transit, by foot, by bike and by carpooling. Even with a high number of people taking sustainable transportation, director of transportation services Anne Eskridge has big hopes for an even more sustainable future at the university. 

In this episode, host Dave Karlsgodt interviews Anne about her more than twenty years of sustainability experience. Anne reflects on waste, water, electric vehicles, electric bikes and regional transportation partnerships. She discusses how to benefit both the planet and the pocketbook and gives advice to future sustainability leaders. She shares not only her sustainability knowledge, but entertaining and powerful anecdotes about her father’s experiences with salmon fishing in the Puget Sound, the role of psychology in the field of sustainability and her background as an auctioneer (listen all the way to the end of the episode to get a sample of her auctioneering talent).

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Episode Transcript:

The following is an automated transcription of this episode which will include errors and omissions. You can listen and follow along with the text here:

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Episode 28: Twenty Years of Sustainability with Anne Eskridge at the University of Washington - Transcript

Episode 27: To Electric Vehicles and Beyond - Low-carbon transportation with Arjun Sarkar

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Arjun Sarkar, Sustainable Transportation Coordinator, University of California, Santa Barbara

Arjun Sarkar, Sustainable Transportation Coordinator, University of California, Santa Barbara

Guests:

Arjun Sarkar
Sustainable Transportation Coordinator, University of California, Santa Barbara

Host:

Dave Karlsgodt
Principal, Fovea, LLC

The United State’s transportation sector lays claim to 29 percent of the country’s total greenhouse gas emissions. Cars, buses, trucks and airplanes, used as a part of daily life, present sustainability challenges that college and university sustainability officials feel poised to tackle.

In this episode, host Dave Karlsgodt sits down with Arjun Sarkar, Sustainable Transportation Coordinator for the University of California, Santa Barbara, to discuss low-carbon alternatives for transportation. In California, transportation accounts for 41 percent of the state’s total greenhouse gas emissions. The discussion ranges from electric vehicles and renewable fuels to the economics of alternative fuel vehicles and hydrogen fuel cell technology. Arjun speaks specifically of UCSB and California as well as themes with national scope.

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Episode Transcript:

The following is an automated transcription of this episode which will include errors and omissions. You can listen and follow along with the text here:

https://otter.ai/s/vVan_gtTQmW4KxMhansNCQ

You can find a text-only version of the transcript here:

https://www.campusenergypodcast.com/episode-27-transcript