Student recounts pitch to IP partner firm Protestors request Green Mountain Coffee's support in halting IP burn

Author: Will Ceurvels

Last Friday, I joined a group of roughly 20 College students to stage a last-minute petition outside of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters' Waterbury, Vt. visitor's center. We were requesting that the company continue to put pressure on its partner firm, International Paper, to delay the controversial tire burn scheduled for Monday at their Ticonderoga, NY plant.

May Boeve '06.5 and Will Bates '06 circulated an email to a wide number of student organizations including WRMC and the Weybridge House, calling on students to engage in dialogue with the coffee company. The issue has been the source of frequent and heated discussion on campus, and the fact that 20 students felt compelled to take time out of their day to travel to Waterbury signals the growing number of college students and town citizens alarmed by the prospect of having the air they breathe contaminated by the combustion products of IP's proposed tire burn.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters is widely praised for its environmentally ethical business practices. The fact that the company has shown itself to be aligned with environmental causes in the past encouraged us to appeal to them. Before Friday, CEO Bob Stiller had yet to voice serious disagreement with International Paper's decision, and we came to Waterbury on Friday hoping to encourage Green Mountain Coffee to force IP into delaying or altogether reconsidering Monday's burn.

Commenting on the Green Mountain's unique position to negotiate with IP, Jamie Henn '07 told us, "We know that Green Mountain's business with International Paper will most likely generate a lot more revenue than will the money saved by burning tires. So if Green Mountain takes up a strong enough position against them, maybe [International Paper] will reconsider."

We did not show up at Green Mountain unannounced. In preparation for last Friday's protest, May and Bates sent out a press release to several major newspapers and local television channels around Waterbury in hopes of attracting Green Mountain's attention even before our arrival on Friday. In the press release, May warned, "We will be protesting outside Green Mountain Coffee Roasters and have a ten-foot smokestack that we will use if we need to."

Having heard from various press sources that a public protest with news coverage was imminent, Stiller put in a phone call to IP President John Faraci. According to Will, "They had a 40-minute conversation on the phone, but we're not sure exactly what they talked about."

When College students and members of the press arrived at Green Mountain on Friday, the petition ensued with a cooperative and peaceful atmosphere. Don Holly, director of corporate quality for Green Mountain, greeted us and fielded questions. Holly enthusiastically described the corn-polymer "eco-cup," which International Paper has developed for Green Mountain as the "most exciting project I have ever been a part of."

Several students were curious about Holly's perspective on IP's planned test burn. Holly explained that, "International Paper needs to do a test burn to see what kind of electrostatic precipitator will be necessary to filter the products of the combustion of tires."

We were dissatisfied with this explanation.

"The test doesn't test for the fine particulates that people are worried about inhaling," said May.

Alex Yule '08 echoed May's sentiments, adding, "they are just doing the burn to collect data so they can tell their stockholders about the economic efficiency of the process."

The peaceful nature of the event was slightly disrupted when members of the media asked for formal, televised statements from Green Mountain Coffee and the petitioners. Flanked by our fellow petitioners and a large smoke stack on which had been written, "IP Tire Burn," May appealed to the CEO of IP asking that he halt plans for the test burn immediately.

"We do not want the young children of Middlebury to grow up in an environment in which they will be subject to harmful chemicals in the air they breathe," May said. Holly respectfully declined our invitation to stand by the smoke stack and a strongly worded imaginary letter from Stiller to Faraci, during his statement to the press. Holly reiterated Green Mountain's stance on the test burn, asking IP to please reconsider, before going ahead with the trial last Monday.

In a telephone conversation later, International Paper representative Donna Wadsworth responded to Holly, telling me, "We've considered this issue from many different perspectives and have concluded that now is the appropriate time to conduct trials. This trial has been deemed appropriate by the Environmental Protection Agency, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, the New York courts and the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. This will be the most rigorous test ever conducted for an alternative fuel in this country."

In our group of students who protested last Friday, many believed that the petition had been at least a partial success.

"By going to Waterbury and petitioning, we helped keep Green Mountain Coffee Roasters and International paper accountable for their business decisions," said Jamie.

For many, however, these positive outcomes were all but eclipsed by the knowledge that IP would still go ahead with the test burn as they had planned. Despite our persistent efforts, along with hundreds if not thousands of Vermonters who participated in protesting the burn via emails, phone calls, or personal protests to IP and its colleagues and consumers, IP initiated the two-week tire burn last Monday.

Others still reserve hope. "We're not done yet," said Will Bates, "plans for direct action on Monday are in the works."

Jamie was equally optimistic, "The upshot of all of this is that, whether they like it or not, we now have Green Mountain Coffee Roasters as an ally in further negotiations with International Paper."