HomeMy WebLinkAbout2024-05-21-SLC-min-copySustainable Lexington Committee
Minutes of Meeting of May 21, 2024
A meeting of the Sustainable Lexington Committee (SLC) was held by Zoom conference. A
quorum of seven was present throughout.
Members Present: Cindy Arens (chair), Celis Brisbin, Paul Chernick, Lin Jensen, Andy
Joynt, Rick Reibstein, Todd Rhodes (vice-chair), Dan Voss,
Members Absent: Charlie Wyman
Staff Present: Maggie Peard
Other Attendees: Atreyi Basu, Ricki Pappo, Dora Liao, Sarela Bliman-Cohen, Nishanth
Veeragandham, Yolanda Yiyun, Sophie Shaw, Michael Boudett,
Charles Hornig, Kavitha Venkatesan, Mark Sandeen.
The meeting was called to order at 6:03 pm. Cindy reminded the committee that the state
continues to allow virtual meetings under the open meeting law and all members present
responded that they could hear.
Approval of past meeting minutes. The draft minutes of April 23, 2024, were unanimously
approved as written.
Comments from residents; emails to committee mailbox; new business.
•Sarela Bliman-Cohen read a statement in support of the use of existing buildings as part
of the High School Building Project.
•Ricki Pappo commented that LexCAN will be hiring an intern to work with Andy Joynt
on LexElectrify programs and that LexCAN will be coordinating a meeting with other
sustainability-focused groups in town to share current plans.
•Rick Reibstein stated that the committee’s comments about the Hanscom expansion have
had an impact and also that the time to comment has been extended to June 15.
SustainabLY update. Atreyi and Dora introduced the new SustainabLY leaders: Sophie Shaw,
Yolanda Yiyun, and Nishanth Veeragandham (who is also on the Transportation Advisory
Committee). They are working on assembling the team for next year. Cindy and Maggie thanked
them all for their great work and look forward to working with the new leaders.
Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of May 21, 2024
Opportunities to work with Nexamp and/or similar companies.
Cindy reminded the committee of the presentation by Nexamp at the last meeting and asked the
committee if it had other thoughts on how to
•Rick suggested that the Town could bring in vendors and have them each give a
presentation on how they could work with the Town and commercial sites to add solar.
•Todd commented that the group working on the Solar Needs/Potential project should
have a presentation ready next month that will include ideas for increasing solar
installations for all sectors including commercial/institutional.
•Ricki commented that the Town doesn’t need to approve a vendor and Cindy added that
it’s mostly about promoting the program. Rick agreed and said that it would be good to
kick-start the program and grease the wheels for implementation.
•Cindy added that any new mixed-fuel building will need to have some solar as part of the
design because of the Specialized Code.
Sustainability & Resilience Officer discussion and updates. Maggie reported:
•Zero-Waste Strategy Presentation: A team of students from Tufts presented the results of a
survey of Lexington residents to assess their perspectives on various approaches to manage/
reduce waste in Lexington – about 1,500 survey responses were received. They team already
presented to the Select Board a few weeks ago. Maggie and Dave Pinsonneault will be
meeting with the Select Board again to get more of the Board’s feedback.
o Maggie provided an overview of the presentation.
o Rick asked about the idea related to bin size. Maggie explained that there are
many approaches for how to manage any pay-as-you-throw (PAYT), or similar,
program. One way is bin sizes. Another approach is to buy special bags.
o Todd asked Maggie what she learned from the survey. She commented that some
of the survey responses like “interest in pay-as-you-throw” was new and helpful
to planning for next steps (e.g., expressed barriers to implementation). Todd
repeated the comment that he heard from the Select Board that while 1,500
responses is a lot for a survey, that it leaves most residents. He commented that
any efforts to change waste pickup will require a great deal of outreach.
o Celis commented that he is not sure that Lexington would be responsive to an
economic driver like PAYT to reduce waste. Other ideas, like the Town of
Lincoln’s drop off for usable items (e.g., swap site) should also be considered
along with donation programs.
o Maggie said that she was at a DEP program for PAYT recently and they have a
technical assistance program that the Town could take advantage of, as well as
implementation grants. The following website for the state program was
identified:
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Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of May 21, 2024
!https://www.mass.gov/lists/pay-as-you-throw-paytsave-money-and-
reduce-trash-smart#payt/smart-curbside-results-
o Lin commented that the survey shows that 70% of residents support composting,
which is a big success for Green Teams, LexCAN, and others who have worked
on this effort over the years. She added that even communities in California have
reduced waste through PAYT.
o Andy added his support for donation programs and warned about risk of residents
moving waste into recycling bins (“wishcycling’) if they don’t have easy ability to
solid waste disposal (e.g., PAYT, every other week pickup).
o Rick suggested that the Town should offer options (e.g., every other week vs.
PAYT)
o Paul commented that he was involved in the original PAYT effort and doesn’t
recall much of an issue with folks dumping waste instead of paying. He agrees
with the swap-site idea. He’s been in the process of removing reusable items and
waste from his home and described the challenge that different items need to go to
specific places and the hours of the facilities are not always convenient.
o Cindy, summarized the conversation and commented that the return of 1,500
surveys is a big result.
o Kavitha stated that she also likes the idea of a swap store, which would be a good
complement to the online options.
o Cindy presented a letter written to the Select Board in support of the points raised
in the presentation and offering support to move forward on the points raised in
the presentation and the Zero Waste Reduction program.
o The committee provided comments on the letter. Cindy and Lin captured the
feedback from the committee and will make edits to address the comments and
send the letter to the Select Board. The committee voted unanimously to support
the letter with Cindy and Lin’s planned updates.
•BEU-D
o It is currently the reporting period for calendar year 2023 energy use – about 50 to
60 reports are in already. Maggie has extended the reporting period to allow
building owners time to add in the water use data (water bills are still going out).
Maggie suggested that the reporting period in the bylaw could be adjusted in the
future to better align with the release of water bills.
o Maggie commented that MIT/Lincoln Labs has volunteered to provide data for
their buildings in this year’s reporting – as a federal site, they are not required to
participate. Todd complimented Maggie for getting this data into the system and
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Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of May 21, 2024
added that data from MIT/Lincoln Labs should be included in the Town’s energy
consumption reports now that it is accessible.
o Maggie recently received a letter from DOER about the state’s Building Energy
Use reporting program, which was part of the state’s 2022 Climate Bill. Maggie
will keep an eye on the development of that program to assess the impact on
Lexington’s BEU-D program.
•Climate Leaders Program
o The Climate Leader Communities program is an extension of the Green
Communities Act. The Town is planning to apply for the program. We already
have many of the requirements in place.
o One element of the program is to have a zero-emission vehicle first program.
Power Options (a non-profit firm that works with municipalities) presented a
Fleet Electrification Roadmap to the Select Board on Monday night (5/20), which
reviewed the current performance of the Fleet Electrification program and
projected forward to 2050.
o Maggie also made some edits to the Fleet Electrification Policy in response to
DOER recommendations. The edits were approved by the Select Board.
o Power Options is also working on the Decarbonization Roadmap looking at solar
potential for municipal buildings and what it will take to decarbonize existing
buildings. The results of that study should be available by the end of the summer.
o The application deadline for the Climate Leaders Program is sometime in July.
o Rick recommended including plans for battery recycling in the Fleet
Electrification plan.
o Rick read Dan’s email asking if there has been a similar study of school vehicles,
which will be needed to understand charging needs at the high school and
elsewhere.
o Maggie is planning an annual report by the end of summer. Some departments are
doing very well following the policy. Others (more specialized vehicles) have not
made as much progress.
•Maggie also reminded the committee to mark your calendars and spread the word for a June
4th event at the Community Center about networked geothermal and the Town's feasibility
study that is underway.
Police Station: Todd provided a brief summary of the progress - the Select Board approved the
plan for the solar canopy that the SLC supported at a recent meeting. The police station is
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Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of May 21, 2024
moving forward (move in will be in June) and things are moving in the right direction for the
canopy.
LHS Project:
•Cindy provided an overview of the current status of the LHS School Building Project.
•Ricki raised a point about embodied carbon and that low-carbon concrete is becoming more
available.
•Dan added that the School Building Committee (SBC) has approved the Preliminary Design
Program (PDP) recommendations including five massing concepts and submitted the
approaches to the MSBA. The submittal doesn’t preclude any options. We are at a key point
now because over the next 6 months they will be getting into more detail about the designs.
•Dan said that in this next phase, we need to be asking questions and defining goals about:
o Transportation (e.g., Will there be space for EV charging of school vehicles?)
o Storage (e.g., How much battery storage will be included?)
o Solar (e.g., Do the concepts provide enough solar to be net zero?)
•The PDP document is online and available for download.
•Lin asked about embodied carbon. She saw that the Green Engineer was considering low-
carbon materials for new construction, but not considering carbon in the existing structures.
She emphasized the need for detailed information about why more buildings can’t be saved
as part of add-reno options.
•Rick emphasized that we should frame the issues as whether we are: “maximizing” natural
areas and wetlands, and “maximizing” use of existing buildings.
•Mark recommended creating scenarios to assess options.
•Cindy presented and added to a list of topics to consider when assessing building options.
•Mark commented that he was at the BoH meeting earlier in the evening and they were
discussing LHS building resilience (e.g., operation as a shelter), reminding Mark that we
should be asking about whether part of LHS can be “islanded” during a power outage.
Wrap Up:
•Cindy identified that Paul’s last meeting will be in June and that we should plan to meet
live.
Next Meeting: The next regularly scheduled meeting of the Sustainable Lexington Committee is
scheduled for 6 pm on June 25, 2024.
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Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of May 21, 2024
The committee voted to adjourn at 9:00 pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Todd Rhodes
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