Our school buildings should provide safe, comfortable learning environments where all students can grow and thrive. Recently in Belmont, however, a gas leak at Winn Brook Elementary did just the opposite, threatening the health of our children, educators, and school staff and interrupting learning with multi-day school closures (“Boiler Issues Close Winn Brook School for Second Day,” Jan. 25).
We no longer have to rely on these outdated, dangerous heating systems. We have better, more sustainable solutions available – we need the support and resources to implement them.
Heat pump installations, solar panels, building system electrification, and insulation upgrades, for example, will make our school buildings safer and healthier while reducing costs associated with legacy fossil fuel infrastructure. With existing buildings in Massachusetts – Winn Brook included – currently contributing nearly one-third of the commonwealth’s total carbon emissions, these energy-saving retrofits are also crucial to hitting our local and statewide climate targets. In our brand-new Belmont High School, heated by state-of-the-art geothermal and powered by solar power, we have a clear blueprint to follow as we work to fix our broken fossil fuel infrastructure in Belmont and beyond.
With new climate legislation under consideration this session, our state leaders have a transformative opportunity to make bold, robust investments in municipal efforts to make buildings safer and more energy efficient across the commonwealth. We must seize this moment to deliver the support that building decarbonization demands and ensure all our cities and towns have what they need to jumpstart our clean energy transition and help build a healthier, more resilient future for all.
Cabell Eames, Lewis Road
Town Meeting Member Precinct 6
Eames is part of a more than 200-member group known as the Zero Carbon Renovation Coalition, pushing for statewide equitable investments in retrofitting buildings to be carbon-free.