Calif. kudos awarded to Vt. teens
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By DAWSON RASPUZZI
Herald Staff - Published: October 26, 2008
Two Vermont teens were nationally recognized for their work as environmental leaders in San Francisco, Calif., Tuesday, where they each received a Brower Youth Award.
Selected from 122 applicants from across the country, 18-year-old Phebe Meyers, of Woodstock and 17-year-old Jessie-Ruth Corkins of Bristol make up one-third of the award winners.
Meyers, a sophomore majoring in environmental studies at Middlebury College, received the award for her work to purchase, conserve and reforest land critical to indigenous birds and Neotropical migrants in Costa Rica.
Her work began well before going to college. In 1998, Meyers and her twin sister, Nika, co-founded the nonprofit organization Change the World Kids, made up of middle and high school students undertaking humanitarian and environmental efforts to make a positive difference in the Upper Valley area and across the globe.
Meyers' plan to invest in the corridor on the Tilarán Mountains of Costa Rica started many years ago.
"I noticed fewer birds at my birdfeeder in Vermont," Meyers said. After going on a trip to Costa Rica five years ago, the plan took a giant step forward.
"I went to Costa Rica with my family and saw all the deforestation; pastures of land where rain forests use to stand, and I thought 'this is not what this landscape is supposed to look like.'"
After talking with Costa Rican biologists and conservationists, Change the World Kids helped establish "Bosque para Siempre," the Spanish translation of "Forever Forest," a migratory corridor critical to the survival of many different bird species, including migrants from New England.
"I later learned there were fewer birds at my own birdfeeder in Vermont because the Neotropical migrants migrated to this very land in Costa Rica that we're now trying to protect," Meyers said.
Through fundraising efforts over the past five years the Woodstock-based organization has raised about $175,000 used to purchase land and plant trees in the corridor.
Meyers said the goal is to protect a corridor with 300 hectors of land, which would cost $1.8 million.
Being so young, Meyers said, has made it difficult to be taken seriously at times, which has made the national recognition that much more appreciated.
Corkins, a freshman at the University of Vermont majoring in environmental science, said she faced ageism while researching the benefits of biomass heating systems.
When Corkins was in ninth grade at Mount Abraham Union High School, in Bristol, she was one of the students who helped persuade the School Board to change its heating system from an oil system to a woodchip heating system.
While doing research, Corkins said it was difficult to get the facts and was often overlooked because of her age.
"At first we were not taken seriously because we were so young," she said. "I found that presence and how you present yourself plays a big difference."
After the high school transitioned to a wood chip system, Corkins realized Vermont does not have the forest capacity to heat the state's population with wood alone. Corkins and Vermont Sustainable Heating Initiative (VSHI), of which she's a leader, then researched alternative biomass energy crops.
Corkins and VSHI came up with a plan to develop the state's 100,000 acres of underutilized farmland to grow a variety of prairie grasses to be pelletized to provide all of Vermont's home heating needs.
The grasses could become a large cash crop for farmers and provide homes and facilities with wood-chip heating systems or pellet stoves an affordable alternative to oil.
"How Vermont heats itself needs to be sustainable, affordable and carbon neutral," Corkins said. "The technology is out there."
VSHI, which is made up of high school and college students, launched a pilot project in two low-income homes in Bristol this summer by transitioning their oil heating systems to pellet stoves.
Each installation costs VSHI $1,700, but the benefits are great, and as it pays itself off, it reduces more than 100 tons of carbon over the life of the system and all of the money would go to Vermont farmers, Corkins said.
VSHI estimates the program's financial returns could eventually reach up to $1.3 billion.
All winners of the Brower Youth Awards, which Earth Island Institute established in 2000 to honor founder and legendary environmental activist David R. Brower, receive a $3,000 cash prize.
To donate or learn more about Meyers' or Corkins' projects, visit www.changetheworldkids.org and www.sustainableheatingvt.org respectfully.
Contact Dawson Raspuzzi at dawson.raspuzzi@rutlandherald.com.
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