Yale U Student Develops Science-Based Tool for Emissions Goals
Based on the question, how much greenhouse gas reduction is enough to prevent humans from crossing a potentially dangerous climate threshold, a student's masters project led to the development of a tool that compares a university's greenhouse gas emissions to a global emissions scenario that is most likely to keep global warming below two degrees centigrade.
Amherst College Creates Statement on Sustainability
The newly adopted statement by the college's 21 trustees calls for the creation of a climate action plan, exploration of renewable sources of energy, investment in campus clean energy and energy conservation, and creating a revolving fund to support other clean energy projects.
Antioch College Holds Sustainable Housing Charrette
The college recently gave an open invitation to the campus and surrounding community to provide input on a housing project that will focus on affordability and environmental impact. Located on campus but open to the community to rent or purchase, the connected units will contain renewable energy and water filtration systems.
Arizona State U Convenes Educational Task Force on Sustainability
The university's new National Sustainability Teachers’ Academy educational task force for sustainability aims to bring teams of elementary, middle and high school teachers from across the nation together to focus on solutions-based curriculum with an emphasis on urban systems. University sustainability scientists and scholars will help coach and lead hands-on sessions on solutions surrounding food, water, energy and climate.
Berry College Holds Tree Campus USA Honor
In the past year, in addition to meeting the Arbor Day Foundation's requirements for the designation, the college started growing trees from seed and grafts for the sole purpose of replanting its grounds with species that are healthy and native, ensuring that trees of historical or good quality endure for years to come.
Brevard College Commits to Fossil Fuel Divestment
The Brevard College Investment Committee presented the motion, calling for divestment of its four percent in fossil fuels by 2018, to the board of trustees, who voted in favor at its annual spring meeting.
California State U Monterey Bay Opens New Sustainable Degree
The new bachelor of science in sustainable hospitality management provides students with local, regional and global perspectives on current and pressing sustainability issues and problems within the hospitality industry. Concentrations exist in sustainable hotel, resort and event management, and sustainable ecotourism management.
Clark U Expands Composting Capacity
Clark Composts, a student group dedicated to education and expansion of campus composting, assisted in expanding intake of compostable material by equipping the library with bins. The student group will focus next on instituting composting in the newest residence hall and in academic departments.
Dalhousie U Partners with Sustainable Seafood Program
The university recently received its first shipment of seafood from the Ecology Action Center's Off the Hook program, which provides fresh, local, high-quality fish caught by fishermen in Nova Scotia via environmentally friendly methods. This along with a Marine Stewardship Council partnership allows all seafood at the university can be traced back through the entire supply chain.
EPA Recognizes Chevy for University and College Partnerships
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently awarded Chevrolet with its Climate Leadership Award for Innovative Partnerships for it's Chevrolet Clean Energy Campus Campaign that enables participating campuses to create a new source of funding for large-scale energy efficiency efforts. The funding comes from carbon credits from the voluntary carbon market. Participating institutions include Ball State University, Valencia College, Portland State University, Spelman College, University of Illinois at Chicago, University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, Boston University, Rochester Institute of Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Grand Valley State University and Southern Oregon University.
Florida Gulf Coast U to Construct Renewable Energy Research Park
The proposed 240-acre research park focusing on environmental sustainability will focus on technologies that impact the use of solar and other renewable sources, structures that combine renewable energy with electric transportation, energy storage, solar desalination of brackish water, anaerobic digestion of food waste on farms, and shade tolerant plants that can grow under solar panels.
Lehigh U Converts to Gender-Neutral Restrooms
In an effort to foster a more gender-inclusive community, many restrooms at the university have been converted from gender-specific to gender-inclusive facilities regardless of how one self-identifies.
Northern Arizona U Heats Air With the Sun
In an effort to decrease fossil fuel use and create a culture of sustainability, the newly installed solar thermal air system is projected to reduce carbon dioxide equivalent emissions by three tons per year.
Ohio U Collaborates on Campus Sustainable Design
A new project will bring together several university offices to brainstorm the best ways to keep university facilities up-to-date on modern, sustainable designs, such as sustainable stormwater runoff and green roof technologies. The main goal of the project, which is on a one-year trial, is to focus on waste management and energy efficiency throughout the construction process, while also maintaining LEED green building certifications.
Portland State U Earns Tree Campus USA Designation
Its 49-acre urban campus recently earned the designation for meeting Arbor Day's Tree Campus USA standards, which include maintaining a tree advisory committee, a campus tree-care plan, dedicated annual expenditures for its campus tree program, an Arbor Day observance, and student service-learning project.
Stanford U Students Petition for Drought-Tolerant Landscaping
The recently presented petition with over 800 signatures asks the university to replace non-signature Stanford grassy areas with native landscaping in order to reduce water consumption. According to the petition, watering plants makes up 40 percent of the university's annual water use.
St. Olaf College Acquire Solar Power for Carbon Neutrality
The college recently announced plans to lease 90 acres of land for the development of 15 one-megawatt solar electric arrays. The college will acquire 40 percent of the project's output. This along with 10 percent from another project enables the college to achieve 100 percent carbon-free electrical power.
U California Merced Hires First Sustainability Director
Colleen McCormick will preside over the university's first sustainability office. McCormick comes from Indiana University-Purdue University's office of sustainability where she served as director for 3-1/2 years. Her position's role includes developing communications and building collaborations among faculty, students, staff and community members in an effort to engage and advance campus and community sustainability initiatives.
U California Santa Cruz Honors People of Color Environmental Work
The university's Ethnic Resource Center recently hosted its first world cafe style discussion aiming to showcase the contributions that people of color have made to the environmental movement and to have a critical dialogue about the current state of the campus environmental movement.
U California System Approves Carbon Neutrality Projects
As part of its efforts to accelerate the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions across the school system, the university recently approved 20 research and outreach projects that focus on leveraging faculty expertise and student creativity to improve the energy efficiency of buildings and develop carbon neutral energy supplies. Some areas that the projects touch on are deep energy efficiency, a research summit, faculty climate action awards, student fellowships, and green labs certifications.
U Hawai'i Adopts Sustainability Policy
At the recent systemwide, annual summit on sustainability, the new executive policy on sustainability includes setting specific targets for reducing energy consumption and increasing utilization of renewable energy in 5-year increments, with a goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050, energy management systems, water conservation, transportation changes, and calls for an increase in local food products.
U Northern British Columbia Reduces Food Waste
Since October 2014, more than 1,000 pounds of food have been provided to local charities from the university's Food Recovery Project that collects and redistributes the surplus food from a new dining hall.
U South Carolina Panhellenic Takes Green Living Strides
One of the university's EcoReps programs, the Green House Certification, was awarded to a Greek house for their implementation of sustainable living practices and is based off of the university's similar certification for dorm rooms. Greek life also initiated Green Greeks, a weekly meeting where attendees learn and discuss one topic within sustainability for representatives to take back to their chapter.
Utah State U Pilots Employee Bike Program
The university is going to conduct a pilot program later this year that allows employees who bike to work to be reimbursed up to $240 a year for commuting costs. It's part of federal legislation enacted in 2009 under the Renewable Energy Tax Credit that adds bicycle commuting to the list of qualified transportation fringe benefits covered in the IRS code.
Florida State U Begins Food Recovery Network Chapter
The new student chapter recovers leftover pre-made food from various locations across campus, including home football games and soon, baseball games, and delivers it to various partner agencies around the city, where it is later distributed to people living in shelters or those who are in need.
Georgia Tech Selects Sustainability-Centered Undergraduate Focus
As part of the university's accreditation process, Serve, Learn, Sustain has been chosen as its newest Quality Enhancement Plan, which seeks to improve undergraduate education by developing academic courses and experiences that combine community involvement with sustainability, and by focusing on global challenges in critical areas of energy, environment, water resources, food security and global health.
Hendrix College Approves Sustainability Fund
The newly approved fund, approved by 80 percent of the 600 students who voted on the initiative, will be created by a dedicated $20 per student per semester fee and will be allocated on a competitive basis to large sustainability projects designed by students, faculty and staff.
Lehigh U to Host Equality-Themed Basketball Game
Sponsored by the university's athletic department and the Pride Center, an upcoming men's game will be themed LGBTQ Equality Game to provide a means for athletes, coaches and fans to stand up and create an atmosphere of inclusion, recognizing the courage and openness of athletes at all levels who have come out as LGBTQ.
North Central College Invests in LED Lighting
A $200,000 investment allowed the university to recently complete the light-emitting diode (LED) retrofit in three buildings, avoiding $35,000 annually in electricity costs. The new lighting includes occupancy sensors and dimming features.
Portland State U Launches Graduate Certificate in Public Design
The university's School of Architecture's new certificate in Public Interest Design aims to prepare students in sustainability, community development and architecture to aid underserved populations through sustainable, human-centered design methods via in-classroom studies and hands-on field experience, working directly with communities in need.
Stanford U to Begin Educational Farm
The new, six-acre farm, opening spring 2015, will be a working farm dedicated to teaching, researching and learning about small-scale agriculture.
Texas A&M U Kingsville Initiates EcoRep Program
The new learning experience developed by students for freshman students focuses on energy, water conservation and waste minimization as principal ways to promote improved campus sustainability.
Texas Christian U Students Increase Campus Sustainability Efforts
At a recent Student Government Association meeting, representatives passed a resolution to create an ad hoc committee to advance student sustainability efforts on campus that includes eliminating paper meeting agendas, offer a paper bag option at campus shopping locations, introduce biodegradable food containers, and create a sustainability education program.
Texas State U Creates Bike-Sharing Program
Abandoned and unclaimed bikes on campus get a second life through the recently launched bike-sharing program that allows the campus community to experience cycling without the cost.
U California System Signs Montreal Carbon Pledge
In an effort to fully implement an environmental, social and governance (ESG) investment strategy, the pledge commits the university to measuring and annually disclosing the carbon footprint of its investments with the goal of using this information to inform carbon asset risk and management strategies. The university also recently joined two other sustainable investment efforts: the Investor Network on Climate Risk and the Carbon Disclosure Project.
U Virginia Begins Employee Sustainability Program
Seeking to reduce its environmental impact by building more efficient spaces, the university's sustainability committee has started its new, self-reporting Green Workplace Program, which uses a checklist of 60 actions that workplaces can implement to improve operations and reduce cost, and includes eight categories: energy, transportation, purchasing, zero waste, community, health, food and bonus credits.
Western Michigan U Recognized by USGBC
The Center for Green Schools at the U.S. Green Building Council recently recognized the university for energy conservation efforts, recycling and waste reduction programs, and for facilitating cooperative research into green manufacturing practices.
ACUPCC Highlights Progress Reports
(U.S.): The American College and University Presidents' Climate Commitment spotlights noteworthy accomplishments from recent progress report submissions that are inspiring and progressive in their goal of attaining carbon neutrality. The highlights include projects from Creighton University, Salisbury University and University of California at Los Angeles.
Cornell U Installs LED Lights in Athletic Centers
(U.S.): Contributing to the school's climate sustaining efforts, the Department of Athletics and Physical Education have begun installing light-emitting diode (LED) lightbulbs in all campus athletic facilities. The project is estimated to save more than 1.7 million-kilowatt hours of electricity and preventing about 450 tons of carbon dioxide annually, avoiding nearly $136,000 in utility bills.
