EcoReps to provide free drying racks next year

Columbia EcoReps want students to hang everything out to dry—except the environment.

Next year, students will be able to request complimentary drying racks from the EcoReps, to cut the energy used by dryers.

After a successful pilot program last year in the Living Learning Center, Stephen Yang, SEAS ’11 and outer co-coordinator in EcoReps, said the group decided to expand the program to the rest of campus.

Emlyn Resetarits, CC ’12 and head of the energy committee in EcoReps, said the idea originally came from students who saw residents in GreenBorough, the special interest brownstone for sustainability, using them.

“We all have these drying racks and people would come over and see them,” Resetarits said. “They’d get envious that we didn’t have to pay for them.”

The program will kick off next year, but advertising for the program has already begun.

“We think it’ll be successful now that we’ve put posters in each of the laundry rooms,” Yang said. He added that the group felt the success of the pilot program guaranteed that there would be student interest. The racks will be loaned to students for one year.

Resetarits, who has now taken charge of this program, said that they decided to start next year, instead of this semester as they had planned, because financing took longer than expected.

“The drying racks and posters … were bought too late in the semester for the program to be very feasible this year,” Reseratis said. “However, the posters are up to hopefully raise interest and awareness of the program.”

Fifty racks have been bought, which adds to a few that were left over from the pilot program, she said.

“Dryers consume more energy than any other appliance,” Zac Accuardi, SEAS ’11 and member of the Green Umbrella, said. “There’s no such thing as an Energy Star dryer.”

Accuardi explained that dryers convert chemical energy to mechanical energy to electrical energy, which then provides heat. Each step has an efficiency loss, so what starts as 100 units of energy might end up as only 30.

The drying racks might improve more than just the environment though.

“It gives students an option and it saves the quality of your clothes,” Yang said. “It covers all aspects—environmental and economic.”

Resetarits agreed that, in addition to helping the environment, she thinks students will like the option of saving money.

“I think students will be excited at the option to dry their clothes for free,” Resetarits said.

But D.J. Dlesk, CC ’14, said he doesn’t think he’d have enough space in his room for a drying rack.

“Would it be big enough for all of my clothes?” Dlesk asked as he paid for his dryer machine in Carman basement. “It doesn’t seem convenient [the racks]... I usually do all my laundry in between activities.”

“There’re some things that make less sense to use a drying rack for,” Accuardi said. “It’s not really practical to dry a sheet on a drying rack.”

karla.jimenez@columbiaspectator.com