Skip to Content, Navigation, or Footer.
Support the IDS in College Media Madness! Donate here March 24 - April 8.
Thursday, March 28
The Indiana Daily Student

arts

IU Art Museum leads green initiative with solar panel installation

The IU Art Museum's Green Team recently added solar panels atop the IUAM building to collect light to save the energy.

The Light Totem at the IU Art Museum has long been a highly visible part of students’ daily 
commutes.

The museum’s Green Team recently added a more sustainable element to the fixture.

Now, solar panels installed atop the IUAM building will collect light, which help offset the energy used by the massive light installation.

Abe Morris, manager of public relations and marketing for IUAM, said though the panels will not directly power the Totem, they are expected to collect equivalent energy to compensate for energy used by the piece.

“The museum has had a Green Team for a number of years — we’d been looking for a way to make the museum more sustainable,” Morris said. “We’ve done past projects like putting recycling bins out in the atrium.”

Created by Professor Emeritus and professional lighting designer Robert Shakespeare in 2006, the Totem uses about 4700kWH of energy each year. Placing solar panels on the roof of IUAM will hopefully help compensate that energy usage, Morris said.

Morris said in preparation for this project, Jeanne Leimkuhler, former president of the Green Team, applied for a grant with the Student Sustainability Council, a group that provides funding for green initiatives.

The Council was able to grant $5,000 toward funding the project, but Morris said the Green Team quickly realized that would not be enough.

“When we had estimates done for the installation, the project came in more expensive than we had initially anticipated,” Morris said. “Facilities operations, who are in charge of doing things like installing the solar panels and overseeing that stuff, were really generous about it and kicked in the additional funding.”

The Office of the Vice President for Capital Planning and Facilities, the larger office behind facilities operations, was able to provide another $10,000 toward this project. The contribution allowed the museum to move forward and install the panels.

Andrew Predmore, associate director of sustainability at IU’s Office of Sustainability, said this sort of collaborative effort is what makes this project 
stand out.

“There is a lot to like about the project from a sustainability perspective, but I’m particularly impressed by the cross-campus collaboration that allowed this to happen,” Predmore said.

Michael French, logistics director for the SSC, said the project falls in line with the general goal of the organization: to donate money toward campus sustainability projects.

“Our goals are generally to make IU a more sustainable place through student involvement in whatever way we can,” French said. “This is one way to put student-donated money to good use.”

Student donations comprise most of the money in the SSC funds that go toward projects like the Light Totem, French said.

Other projects, such as a recently installed rain garden, tend to be more obvious results of SSC funding, whereas French said the Light Totem is a more abstract project.

“The Light Totem is one of the more visible things on campus,” French said. “So, as opposed to making something new, we’re making something that already exists as sustainable as it can be.”

Morris said he is excited a fixture that contributes to IU tradition will now have an element of environmental awareness.

“Now it’s a great thing because the Light Totem is one of the big things that people notice on campus,” Morris said. “It’s on the student bucket list and all that, to put your feet up by the Totem. We’re really excited that it can be both a great work of art on campus but also something that points toward a more sustainable future and IU being a greater place.”

Leimkuhler said this project will demonstrate to students how the museum is working to move forward into the future of cleaner energy.

“Now they will know, as they are enjoying the ever-changing colored wall at night, that the sculpture is being powered with clean energy from the sun,” Leimkuhler said. “As we all move toward a more sustainable energy future, it is exciting to see the IU Art Museum leading the way with this very colorful project.”

Get stories like this in your inbox
Subscribe