Sarah Sutton 1983

When climate change advocates talk about reducing the carbon footprint, they rarely mention museums, zoos, gardens and aquariums. Sarah Sutton, Class of 1983, is setting out to correct that oversight.

Co-author of a seminal book on the issue, The Green Museum, Sarah is chief executive officer of a nonprofit dedicated to educating cultural institutions about what they should do and how they can fund these projects.

“It’s very tempting to say, ‘We’re charitable institutions; we’re doing our best to survive. It’s big oil’s problem.’ And yes, big oil is a major contributor, but this is an all-hands-on-deck situation,” Sarah says. “Everyone has to do whatever they can.”

In some cases, simply reducing energy use can save money, while lowering a museum’s carbon footprint. In other cases, rethinking how to prepare for climate change or natural disasters or examining related social justice issues is required.

At times, cultural institutions work in concert with public agencies. For instance, the Seattle Aquarium wanted to create a robot to monitor the growth of kelp underwater but had no funding. The Port of Seattle needed to monitor the port’s impact on underwater sea life but had no mechanism for measurement. So the two entities helped each other.

Sarah didn’t come to Sweet Briar for environmental science. “I came for the horses,” she recalls. “I was going to select a school that had a strong riding program, and I felt at home the moment I arrived on campus.”

Her work with the College’s Riding Council taught her leadership and organizational skills. Her major in American Studies, blending literature and history, led her to seek a master’s degree at William & Mary. She spent about a decade working in historical settings, from internships at Colonial Williamsburg to museum posts in Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts.

After having children, Sarah switched to a consultant’s role, often writing fundraising grants. At one point, she worked on a grant to develop a sustainability plan for a campus and wondered why museums weren’t doing the same.

She and a colleague started working on the issue and co-wrote The Green Museum, first published in 2008. She also began lecturing and teaching on the subject. Three years ago, she co-founded Environment and Culture Partners, which aims to research key questions and provide museum professionals with smart answers.

The first step, she says, was to assess how much energy cultural institutions are using. The nonprofit worked with 140 institutions to measure their energy use and carbon impact. From that, they were able to extrapolate that U.S. cultural sector produces 4 million metric tons of carbon dioxide annually. That needs to be cut in half by 2030 to meet the U.S. goals.

The nonprofit is working with the artist-endowed Helen Frankenthaler Foundation to give away $10 million to art museums for energy efficiency or clean-energy projects. Sarah would like to see similar support for children’s and science museums, plus zoos and gardens.

“We’re focusing on changing absolutely everyone’s expectation,” she says. “The cultural sector is so overlooked in its general value to society, but particularly in its role in climate action.”