Construction of Graduate Housing Raises Concerns

The construction of graduate-student housing on Cowperthwaite Street raised ire from surrounding residents in a meeting Friday morning, when they said they fear that the use of high-sulphur fuel may provoke a health crisis in the neighborhood.

At the often-combative meeting, neighbors pushed University officials to replace the high-sulphur diesel fuel, used to operate the excavation crane, with low-sulphur diesel fuel.

The crane consumes approximately 250 gallons of the fuel a day.

The difference in cost would amount to 85 cents per gallon, according to Sam Lipson, who is director of environmental health at the Cambridge Department of Public Health.

“I...indicated that this was something that was clearly not required but that I’d like to see,” Lipson said, although he added that he was not convinced the swap would reduce health risks for the area.

While the change would cost the University slightly more than $200, according to Director of Community Relations for Cambridge Thomas J. Lucey, it would also require Harvard to find a new fuel supplier and possibly store it offsite.

The University is not known to have violated any laws, and Harvard has refused to meet the residents’ demands.

“All of the equipment on site meets city and state regulations,” Lucey said.

But neighbors expressed fears of cancer-bearing cement particles and rising water levels associated with the site. Sulphurous substances have been linked to reproductive failure, hearing defects, and lung embolism in humans.

According to Lucey, the University had already taken several steps to reduce the crane’s emissions.

The low sulphur fuel is used in University shuttles and the City’s public transit system.

Project Manager Steve Nason said that the use of low-sulphur fuel was “not something that’s done commonly in Cambridge” and attributed the University’s opposition to financial considerations.

“The fact is that we have newborns in this neighborhood and the very elderly,” said Carol Bankerd, a resident of the neighborhood. “This is a really serious issue.”

Toward the end of the meeting, Councilor Marjorie C. Decker, who recently announced that she was running for Massachusetts state senate, proposed that the City fund the fuel-swap.

But Lucey said the University would not accept the funds if offered.

“In my opinion it was very sarcastically said,” said Harvard’s Mitigation Manager Ed Leflore of Decker’s proposition.

Decker could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Including Lipson and Decker, four city officials were present at the meeting. There were also at least five University representatives in attendance.

“It is very unusual to have this kind of intensity on one project,” Decker noted.

—Staff writer Natalie I. Sherman can be reached at nsherman@fas.harvard.edu.