Coe students and others embark on low-impact living

Posted on Oct 23, 2009 by Cindy Hadish.

Coe College junior Clarissa Thomas, a biology and psychology major from Chippewa Falls, MN, stands in the greenhouse area of Coe's EcoHouse in Cedar Rapids on Tuesday, October 20, 2009. the four students living in the home plan to grow letttuce, bean sprouts, basil and other herbs throughout the winter. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette)

What would you give up to save the Earth?

Your car? Coffee? Toilet paper?

Students living in Coe College’s new EcoHouse are trying to demonstrate that an environmentally friendly lifestyle doesn’t have to be painful.

“If you plan a little, it’s completely doable,” said Clarissa Thomas, a junior biology major from Chippewa Falls, Wis.

Thomas, 20, is one of four Coe students living in a pink two-story house at 15th Street and C Avenue NE, designated this year as Coe’s EcoHouse.

The four have been buying produce from farmers markets, worked at an organic farm in exchange for fresh vegetables, walk or bike to classes, compost food scraps and grow herbs that they use in their meals. They also recycle more and watch what they buy, including items with less packaging.

The idea is gaining momentum as students and parents seek information on prospective colleges’ sustainability efforts, said Susan Wolverton, theater arts professor and faculty adviser for the Coe Environmental Club.

Grinnell College began an EcoHouse last year in which 10 students explore ways to improve energy-efficiency, reduce water use, grow some of their food and educate others.

Coe’s EcoHouse has similar goals.

Four students are living at the EcoHouse owned by Coe College on C Ave in Cedar Rapids on Tuesday, October 20, 2009. The students are participating in the No Impact Project. (Cliff Jette/The Gazette)

Students plan to further their efforts next week with the “No Impact Experiment.” The experiment is based on “No Impact Man,” a book and documentary by Colin Beavan.

Beavan, his wife and 2-year-old daughter lived one year in New York with as little environmental impact as possible. That included biking or walking instead of automated transportation, all local foods (meaning no coffee), no material consumption and 6 months without electricity.

The film made its Iowa premiere this week at Coe during the Environmental Film Festival and will be shown again today.

While Beavan’s family went so far as to use cloths instead of toilet paper, the EcoHouse won’t go to that extreme. Thomas said each day of the week has a different challenge. For example, one day they will go without electricity.

Kate Kedley’s family is already taking part in the No Impact Experiment this week in Iowa City. Her 10-year-old son, Kaiser Kedley-Bergmann, said he doesn’t miss television, which the family already did without. Instead, he plays outdoors or reads, he said.

On “lower consumption day,” they brought cloth napkins to a restaurant and asked for no straws in their drinks.

“A lot of it is reinforcing what we already do,” said Kedley, a Kirkwood Community College teacher.

Her partner, Sara Shreve, said the family used peaches instead of raisins in their oatmeal and ate locally grown vegetables during the week’s local foods day.

“Everything I’ve changed or given up has been surprisingly easy,” she said.

Advocates say that’s the point: Helping the environment should be simple and inexpensive.

“It’s not about deprivation,” Beavan says in the movie. “Is it possible to have a good life without wasting so much?”