Bio bus urges students to get on board

Eco-Week seeks to help environment

At a time when environmental issues are at the forefront of the American conscience, in politics and scientific research, the College of Charleston is promoting sustainable and Earth-friendly living while joining others on the bandwagon. Or rather, the bus.

The school's chapter of the Coastal Conservation League, the Sustainability Committee and Alliance for Planet Earth, kicked off Eco-Week last week with a visit from a big blue school bus.

Sophia Rodriguez/The Post and Courier

BioTour's bright blue converted school bus is starting to get recognized across the country as the nonprofit makes presentations to schools and communities. The bus has solar panels on top and its diesel engine runs on hot, thin vegetable oil.

The BioTour bus is not quite like the Magic School Bus, but it performs some fairly amazing feats. For instance, the 1989 diesel engine gets anywhere from 1,500 to 2,000 miles on a full tank, according to Ethan Burke, co-director of BioTour.

"We run mostly on used vegetable oil we get from restaurants," he said, although they also use biodiesel.

Burke and his three other comrades who work for the nonprofit have rigged the underbelly of the bus with three 50-gallon barrels to store the vegetable oil. They usually get it from Chinese or vegetarian restaurants because the oil is cleaner.

The bus also has solar panels on the roof to generate energy and flooring made from sustainable fast-growing bamboo. Students and passers-by were able to take a guided tour of the bus, both outside and the living quarters inside, which contain a few beds, a couch and a makeshift bookshelf. The BioTour group has crossed the country at least four times, Burke said, and they make stops along the way at schools and community events to talk about sustainability, climate change, environmental degradation and their travels.

"We live on this bus. It's our office, it's our home. We use it all the time," Burke said.

Eco-Week is just the tip of the iceberg, a fun way to draw in students for RecycleMania. For 10 weeks, the College of Charleston will compete against more than 200 universities across the United States to see which school can recycle the most paper, bottles, cans and corrugated cardboard. Last week's events were to raise student awareness through a variety of activities. S. David Stoney, director of the McClellanville-based Kitchen Table Climate Study Group, gave a lecture about how the Earth will be affected if its inhabitants don't start taking preventive measures now, and the link between humans' unconscious fears and how that affects the response to climate change.

"This is the biggest problem that human beings have ever had to deal with. How will we keep up a level of integrity if we turn our backs on it?" he asked during his talk.

On Tuesday, a group went up to Columbia to lobby state lawmakers to pass laws that promote environmental practices.

"I think a lot of people were extremely receptive," said Nikki Seibert, a RecycleMania organizer who is pursuing a master's degree in environmental science at the college. She said even those who are not traditionally involved in environmental causes attended. Among the issues the group lobbied for were new tax laws on annexation.

Seibert said that some of the week's activities, such as the composting class held by the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control on Friday, have appealed to a lot of people outside the student community.

"Sustainability is becoming a huge issue in Charleston and nationally," she said. "We really want to connect the college with the city."

Reach Sophia Rodriguez at 937-5538 or srodriguez@postandcourier.com.