In 2012, with the leadership of student government, the Environmental Center started purchasing carbon offsets to mitigate the greenhouse gasses and climate footprint of energy used by the student-owned buildings on campus. For the previous school year, that translates to 11,670 metric tons听of CO2. While CU听continuously works to reduce energy use and consumption, carbon offsets are used to counteract any听greenhouse gas emissions the university was unable to avoid causing.
The Environmetal Center is happy to work with Native Energy, a climate-solutions expert听that听often partners with Native American tribes to initiate carbon offsets and renewable energy projects. The carbon offset funds not only听help mitigate some of the university's ecological impacts听but also have听a strong social and community benefit.听This year, CU听chose to collobrate on a project in Colorado that is close enough to campus for students to visit.听
The Methane Recovery Project captures methane seeping from natural coal seams, which听would otherwise leak out into the environment in La Plata County on the Southern Ute tribal land. The methane is then听injected听it into the natural-gas distribution grid, where it is burned for either thermal energy or power generation.
This project would not be possible without听the carbon offsets funding. Because of the low volume of methane seeping near the coal outcroppings, it was not economical for the Southern Ute Tribe to install conventional coal-bed-methane (natural gas) production wells and collection piping. By capturing and destroying the methane gas, this project will avoid 23,000 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions from听growing to 60,000听annually.
