Posts by Mira Chiasson
Dalhousie on track to meet greenhouse gas reduction targets
Rochelle Owen, the director of the Office of Sustainability at Dalhousie University, says she’s confident the university can meet its greenhouse gas reduction target of 50 per cent by 2020, and net zero by 2050. According to its last greenhouse gas inventory, Dalhousie University emitted 98,659 tonnes of greenhouse gases in 2014-2015. These are gases…
Read MoreDIY renewable energy
What do an old bike, water jugs, a steel rod, a generator and a car battery have in common? A group of mechanical engineering students at Dalhousie are using all of them as part of a renewable energy project. They’re also using a few other materials and bits of hardware, but the essence of their…
Read MoreBrianna Maxwell shares some sustainable life hacks
Brianna Maxwell’s garbage fits in a jar. So far it’s a couple tags, some Band-Aids and a plastic straw. Maxwell has been living a sustainable lifestyle for several years, but in January she decided to take it one step further and challenge herself by starting a zero-waste project. She finds creative ways to re-use, replace…
Read MoreFrom the ends of the earth to Halifax
Jasveen Brar has visited both poles and has seen firsthand some of the challenges these remote areas of the planet face. From seeing plastic water bottles among half a million penguins to learning about climate change, Brar’s experiences in the polar regions changed her. That’s why she decided to bring a discussion about the poles…
Read MoreMicro-adventuring in Halifax
It’s a mild Sunday morning just before Reading Week. Twenty students pile into a Metro Transit bus, filling the near-empty vehicle with their chatter. The group includes first-time hikers and trail veterans. They’re heading out on a nine-kilometre winter hike to the Bluff Wilderness Trail, organized by Trips by Transit. Formerly known as Adventure by…
Read MoreKing’s students grade Halifax on climate change
Two students from the University of King’s College are giving Halifax a C+ for the city’s work on climate change. First-year students Lilian Barraclough and Cameron Yetman started collecting data this fall to generate a climate change report card for Halifax as part of a campaign called iMatter Now. iMatter Now was started in the…
Read MoreCycling through the snow
It’s not easy to miss the bundled-up cyclists on the Halifax streets. Wearing bright colours, reflective tape and, sometimes, goggles, they seem to be out even in the foulest weather. If you’ve seen the recent video by 22 Minutes, “Hinterland Who’s Who: Winter Cyclist,” you might even have had a good laugh about it. But…
Read MoreDal students work to further UN’s Sustainable Development Goals
For Paul Bissonnette, the adventure started in summer 2016. Two weeks before he was scheduled to be in New York for the World Merit 360 conference, the fourth-year chemistry student loaded a hundred pounds of gear onto his bicycle, including solar panels and air-quality measurement instruments. He jumped on a ferry to Portland, Maine, and…
Read MoreLoaded Ladle looks for levy increase
The Loaded Ladle is hoping to gather at least 900 student signatures in support of a $1.50 levy increase. Right now, each student pays $6 a year for three meals a week. That works out to about six cents a meal per student. With the proposed levy increase, the budget would rise to 12 cents…
Read MoreOutdoor adventuring made easy through new gear library
Evan Groen was patching up a pile of tents donated to the Dalhousie Outdoor Society (DOS), when he came up with an idea. Here was all this gear, sitting around, not really being used. What if he started a gear library? The system would be similar to the Dalhousie Bike Centre: gear, loaned out to…
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