In a meeting with the State News editorial board, MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon said a 17 percent decrease in energy use on campus would help keep tuition at its current level. Without the 17 percent decrease, students might have some extra bills to pay.

This is understandable due to the number of students and staff members using large amounts of energy on campus. While most people on MSU’s campus seem to be careful with resources, it’s doubtful that many students have turned their heat down these past few single-digit days.

While it’s great to know that Simon and the university staff are thinking about cutting our tuition costs, this plan to cut energy by 17 percent seems a little out of reach for now.

This would mean cutting about nearly one-fifth of our energy usage in a short period of time. That would require that every student on campus drastically change their habits. Entire departments would have to get on board in order to make a real impact in the fight to cut energy costs and every residence hall would have to change the way they operate on a day-to-day basis.

MSU has to rely on energy cutbacks because there is not much room elsewhere to cut corners. The university does not want to scale back in areas on campus so as not to take away the rights of individual departments, Simon said.

The energy-reducing plan is definitely optimistic but might not be realistic. There is a large amount of energy already wasted on campus. Food waste, overused heat from thermostat settings and leaving the lights on are a few things that the university would have to crack down on.

Perhaps requiring that every cafeteria go trayless, or lowering heat options in residence halls would get us closer to our goal. Even installing light sensors in bathrooms could help lower our waste levels at MSU.

Students are fully capable of realizing the severity of the problem. Surely with a promise of no increases in tuition, they would get serious about their energy use.

Even with these changes we probably would not reach that magic number. Simon spoke about putting a new bio-pellet facility on campus that would reduce our usage of coal. The pellets would be made of sewage and, of course, be more environmentally friendly.

While this seems like a solid plan, most initiatives like this don’t end up producing any benefits for quite a while. Unless someone is planning on still paying tuition 15 years from now, this won’t solve immediate problems.

We admire the idea of cutting back on energy costs and reducing our carbon footprint . But without a feasible plan of action, it’s hard to imagine progress.

Hopefully, once more planning is finished and concrete goals are established, energy -savers will feel closer to the finish line. Until then, students should keep hoping for other miraculous ways to lower tuition and try to remember to turn off the water while they brush their teeth.