POUGHKEEPSIE – When other counties were barely considering building with green environmental principles, Dutchess County had already launched its Dutchess Goes Green initiative several years ago.

The county has remodeled old facilities into the Eastern Dutchess Government Center, including the use of geo-thermal heating and cooling. The county’s emergency services/911 center is being remodeled with a geo-thermal system as well.

County Executive William Steinhaus said they are employing a number of green practices.

“We’re doing it with the kinds of vehicles we have in our fleet, the way we build our buildings and the way we look at alternate energy systems for our facilities,” he said. “We’ve done some remodeling even within our own county complex of changing mechanical systems designs for heating and cooling and changing some of the insulation and even the kind of light systems that are in there.”

Ulster County has introduced its first hybrid mass transit bus and Orange County is going to build its new community college campus in Newburgh using green principles. It has also employed greening of its government center lighting systems.