|
| |
|
|
Get Your Campus Involved!
Action Ideas from NJHEPS
There are many ways that students, staff, faculty and administrators can advance sustainability on their campuses and in their communities, both as individuals and through organizations. We urge all NJ campuses to add their energies and expertise to NJHEPS efforts, which are detailed below. We also offer a list of projects and strategies that focus on specific areas of campus life and curriculum. As so much of human life impacts sustainability, there are sustainability opportunities in almost everything we do and study!
Work with NJHEPS!
- Become an NJHEPS Member! This will insure your close participation with dozens of higher-education partners at work implementing sustainability on their campus, and the advice and support of NJHEPS staff and technical teams. Check our membership page: if your campus is a member, contact us to learn who NJHEPS works with on your campus; if your campus is not a member, ask your president to join.
- Sustainable Campus Initiative:An integrated, comprehensive approach is most effective, and we invite all New Jersey campuses to work with NJHEPS to organize multi-stakeholder Sustainability Teams on their campus, and to implement the Sustainable Campus Initiative for campus change, which targets energy, green design, sustainable materials use, education for sustainability, student involvement, and public education.
- Subscribe to the NJHEPS listservs for up-to-date information on NJHEPS initiatives, New Jersey events, and higher-education sustainability news.
Other Comprehensive Sustainability Steps
- Invest in Green Energy: It makes both environmental and financial sense to not be "penny-wise and pound-foolish" when making campus building and energy decisions. Payoffs from higher first costs for certain green energy and building options are increasingly reliable and increasingly quantifiable, and many tools exist that clarify these benefits. An increasing number of energy projects have break-even or positive cash flow, as energy savings equal or exceed monthly payments (ENERGY STAR's Cash Flow Opportunity Calculator is a useful tool). A Revolving Loan Fund for Energy and Green Design has superior or competitive return on investment when compared to almost any other investment strategy.
- Green Student Fees: implement small student fees for green projects such as buying green electricity, funding solar energy, buying fair-trade coffee, or building green dorms/campus centers.
- Assess your campus' environmental impact and overall sustainability performance. Measure your campus' ecological footprint (contact us for a campus footprint calculator), or rate your campus with the National Wildlife Federation, Campus Ecology Program's State of the Campus Environment assessment tools or the NJHEPS Campus Sustainability Snapshot.
- Work with Supportive Organizations: National Wildlife Federation's Campus Ecology Program, SustainUS, RUSustainable, CampusActivism.org.
Energy & Emissions
Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions
- Help your campus participate in the Greenhouse Gas Action Plan: a commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 3.5% below 1990 levels by 2005. All New Jersey college and university presidents made this commitment in 2001 (see this press release), but many colleges have yet to provide us with data on campus energy and fuel usage. Contact us if you're interested in providing us with this data from your campus. For further information, visit our GGAP Protocol web page.
- Work with Clean Air-Cool Planet to produce a comprehensive emissions survey and reduction plan for your campus, including transportation impacts.
- Work with The Climate Campaign to network with other students and student organizations seeking to reduce their campus' emissions.
Reduce Energy Use on Campus
- Help your campus become an NJHEPS Energy Partner Institution. All that is required is that institutions attend workshops and participate with NJHEPS staff and the NJHEPS Energy Technical Team to measure energy performance and develop an Energy Report and Action Plan.
- Visit the NJHEPS Energy & Emissions web page for up-to-date information on energy events, workshops, initiatives, and funding opportunities.
- Download and use the NJHEPS Campus Energy Toolkit, designed to be a practical practical resource for facilities managers, with information on energy efficiency technologies, renewable options, administrative and policy suggestions, financing information, and resources for further exploration.
- Distribute this Orientation Flyer, whenever and wherever possible, which contains energy-saving tips -- or use its information to create a custom Orientation Flyer for your campus.
- Did you know that your desktop computer, if left on 24/7, may consume $110 of electricity and produce 1600 lbs of CO2 per year? Save money and reduce emissions with green computer use practices! Download this one-page flyer (Adobe Acrobat PDF) you can share with your IT department or college computer/printing facility. The flyer offers strategies for both departments and individuals to follow to reduce paper use and use less computing energy. (Harvard's Green Campus Initiative also offers online information about its Computer Energy Reduction Program at www.greencampus.harvard.edu/CERP/).
- Work with Residence Life staff in your dorms to implement energy education and energy-saving equipment and policies. Did you know, for example, that chargers for cellphones and PDA's consume power even when not actively charging an electronic device? Or that low-energy flourescent lamps exist that provide warm, appropriate light for all uses, and save campuses so much money that it actually makes sense to give them free to incoming students? You can also set up an ENERGY STAR model dorm room -- this website provides inspiration and detailed how-to information.
- Work to implement general energy-smart campus heating and cooling policies (see University of Buffalo policies for guidance and inspiration).
High Performance ("Green") Design
- Enlist the expertise of the NJHEPS Green Design Team when developing or modifying a campus plan or planning a new building or major renovation.
- Conduct an integrated-design and multi-stakeholder charrette at the initial stages of a renovation or new construction project.
- Consider attaining LEED™ certification for new buildings or (soon) for an extensive retrofit of an existing building. This can be done for no first-cost premium or for a small 1-2% cost premium (for even higher energy efficiency that will generate substantial savings over the life of the building).
- Read and use the NJHEPS High Performance Campus Design Handbook. Volume One: Overview and Rationale describes the New Jersey context and makes the case (available now as $10 order or free download). Volume Two: Green Design Guidelines also available for order.
- Work with Labs21 to create and operate green, energy-efficient laboratories.
Sustainable Materials Use & Environmentally Preferable Purchasing
- See all the suggestions, achievements and resources available on the NJHEPS Sustainable Materials Use page.
- Use the comprehensive resources available at the New Jersey Solid Waste Policy Group website: EPP information, recycling and waste management tools, etc.
Education for Sustainability
- Contact the NJHEPS Education Committee for ideas about how to infuse sustainability into your programs and courses.
- Climate Change Education: Tune in for information on Rutgers Professor Alan Robock's local climate change model, and its usefulness in a variety of courses. Also visit the EPA's list of Climate Change Education Resources for colleges and universities.
- Sustainability Curriculum Modules: Expect breaking news about a National Science Foundation education grant, to develop 4 sustainability WebQuests that involve local New Jersey issues.
- Sustainability in Business: Visit BeyondGreyPinstripes to learn from programs infusing sustainability, full-cost accounting, life-cycle assessment, and the "triple bottom line" into business education.
- Ecological Economics: The US Society for Ecological Economics works to illustrate the profound connection between economic activity and the ecosystem, and to realign economic assumptions so that they are in keeping with the vast but finite capacities of our planet.
- "Why the Markets Can't Fix Themselves:" An overview of some of the limitations on free markets as magic remedies for all current social ills.
Student Involvement
- Visit our Student Involvement page to find links to New Jersey campus environmental organizations and both local and national organizations that support campus enviromental & sustainability involvement. (Please contact us with changes or additions.)
Public Education
- We invite you to reach out to your local communities and positively impact community development:
- The Rutgers involvement with Highland Park can serve as an inspiring model: contact Clint Andrews and the students of RUSustainable for further information.
- Work with local government to develop and use local indicators to monitor progress towards sustainability: visit Maureen Hart's Sustainable Measures website for guidance.
- Connect your research and teaching to the broad array of New Jersey sustainability indicators assessed periodically by the New Jersey Sustainable State Institute.
Food
- Recycle Food Waste at one of these locations -- Princeton does it (see article).
- Organize a Jersey Fresh food day at your school -- a fair or one day when the school food service provides Jersey Fresh local food.
- Organize an organic food day at your local dining hall or cafeteria -- Princeton did it in February 2003!
- Work with NOFA-NJ to get organic food on campus.
NJHEPS GRATEFULLY ACKNOWLEDGES THE SUPPORT OF:
Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation
New Jersey Board of Public Utilities
NJHEPS Corporate Sponsors
AT&T Foundation
AT&T, Inc.
and its 42 Member Institutions
