DURHAM, N.H. (AP) – College officials from around New England and eastern Canada are looking at saving energy to help the environment, and their budgets.

“Its not a bad thing to admit that much of the drive for energy conservation comes from our need to be fiscally responsible,” UNH President Ann Weaver Hart said at a conference on Friday.

She addressed about 60 planners at the New England Governors and Eastern Canadian Premiers College and University Climate Change Symposium.

Hart urged cooperation between university planners, administrators and government to find and implement energy-efficient ways to save colleges money and energy and cut pollution.

The symposium was part of a partnership in which about 80 colleges in New England and Eastern Canada pledged this year to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to John Shea of the governors group. Scientists believe the gasses cause global warming.

Shea told the symposium colleges and universities are a resource to develop efficient technology and to provide conservation education.

And he said energy conservation is an easy decision for schools struggling to make ends meet.

“There’s a built-in self-interest within the university community to save money,” he said. “It will save cash-strapped state institutions as well as private institutions considerable amounts of money.”

Ned Reynolds, a senior program officer with the Portsmouth environmental lobbying group Clean Air-Cool Planet, said there are “enormous savings to be had,” through energy-saving practices such as setting computers to run on “sleep” mode, which essentially turns monitors off when no one is using them.

—

Information from: The Union Leader, http://www.theunionleader.com

AP-ES-06-19-04 1425EDT