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In December of 2022 Aaryaman Patel, a Mechanical Engineering student, published a video for a competition through the International District Energy Association. The purpose of the video is to highlight energy systems within a University campus.
Below is the link to his video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLrt4X0EOGA
On December 13th, the Land & Water iCAP team met to discuss a new approach to crafting recommendations for next semester; including the creation of a land subcommittee and a water subcommittee.
Meeting minutes are attached.
On December 8th, the Zero Waste iCAP team met to discuss a new approach to creating recommendations for next semester. During the meeting, the team created subcommittees based on aspects of the key priorities document and provided feedback on an environmental engineering sustainability project.
Meeting minutes are attached.
Please see attached the final presentation for the CTAC fall 2022. Watch the meeting recording here: https://uofi.box.com/s/6fp2xuq2qnwv4vgm34itku4pbdy2bioy
On May 28, 2022 Meredith Moore sent an email to Arthur Schmidt regarding the status of the Water 006 recommendation:
Hi Art!
I hope you are well. I am reaching out to check in about the status of the Water006 recommendation: Lot23 Monitoring. This is an old recommendation that was returned back to the Water and Stormwater SWATeam in August 2019. It can be found here: https://icap.sustainability.illinois.edu/project-update/water006-lot-f23-monitoring-returned. Based on the project update, a proposal for funding was to be submitted to the Student Sustainability Committee. Are you aware if this happened?
I look forward to hearing from you. Thanks!
Meredith
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On November 30, 2022 Mrogan White sent the following to Arthurt Schmidt:
Hi Art,
Could you please answer these quick questions?
Thanks!
Morgan
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On Dec 1, 2022 Art responded:
Hi, Morgan:
Many years ago when this first came up we installed an instrumentation vault at the SE corner of the lot where the storm sewer pipe leaves the lot. We never received any funding to move forward with this, so no instrumentation ever installed.
I would be thrilled to help/advise with moving this forward. I would also try to find portions of this where my Field Methods class could help install/calibrate/maintain instruments or collect samples. I have a couple classes were we could use the data.
Art
The next steps for the project progress would be to review the past BFU applications from 2011 - 2019 to understand the stage we as a university are at currently and would help to identify, compare and contrast the work across these timelines to improve the status and make recommendations after reviewing the feedback.
In the past weeks, Aparna reviewed the BFU Application to understand the scope of work, did research/literature review work, and familiarized herself with the current initiatives taken by the university at present to combat bike thefts. Moreover, she also had a conversation with a transportation staff from UCLA and ASU who had recently reached out to me on their ideas/approach on this topic for a qualitative aspect of this project. The same was also discussed with her capstone advisor, Prof. Lindsay Braun to go over the progress and find better clarity.
On November 7th, the Zero Waste iCAP team met to discuss DIA sustainability initiatives with Tim Knox and made edits on the Project 4 Less expansion recommendation to be submitted in the coming month(s).
Meeting minutes are attached.
On November 7th, the Land and Water iCAP team met to review the results of the Milkweed survey, make final edits to the Monarch Butterfly recommendation, and discuss new recommendations inspired by the Campus Landscape Master Plan.
Meeting minutes are attached.
This week Aparna got in touch with the staff of transit services from Arizona State University to understand their approach to achieving the Gold BFU certification.
Sarthak and Aparna also had a quick overview of the materials shared and brainstormed ideas/recommendations to raise awareness in the campus community as well as keep bike thefts in mind.
The next steps would be to familiarize with the topic better, collect all the research materials and make notes/highlight the existing implementation, and make comments on these.
The reasons for the putative decrease in recycling rate include the increase in plastic production, flat change in recycling capacity, and China no longer accepting our recyclables. A Time magazine article further suggests that the estimated 9% recycling rate from 2018 was inflated because most of the plastic we sent to China was landfilled or incinerated. Another interesting point: an estimated 30-36% of collected PET is wasted in the recycling process.
The original report can be accessed here: https://bit.ly/US-plastics-recycling-rate . Table 2 provides estimates and sources.
Attached is an article sent by Andrew Stumpf discussing the social cost of carbon.
In this meeting, potential ideas for secured bicycle parking were discussed as ways to promote awareness among the campus community. A capstone proposal outlining the final objectives and deliverables was drafted and Sarthak helped support this discussion sharing an Excel sheet that has all of the goals, current status, and plans for the future of some mentioned ideas towards achieving the said objectives with challenges that are yet to be tackled.
This week, Aparna is going to try to get in touch with the transportation team from other universities that have achieved the Gold BFU status to gather some ideas specific to raising awareness about bike thefts. This would navigate the research better.
Aparna is also spending her initial time on the project learning about the Bike registration process and other initiatives that are already ongoing at UIUC to help understand the way forward. She also has access to the iCAP portal to update and document the weekly meetings to keep a track of the project progress.
Below is an email from Serena Armendaris with Carbon Solutions Group:
Hey Morgan,
My name is Serena Armendaris and I work for a firm called Carbon Solutions Group (CSG). We specialize in environmental credits & projects for ESG claims and have been in the business since 2006. Our Sustainability offerings include:
Currently, Reporting Year 2022 Wind RECs are offered @ $1.90/MWh and US Carbon Offsets are @$9.25.
Do you think anyone on your team might have time for a 15 minute introductory call to discuss further?
Thanks and regards,
From: David Bryant <david.bryant@gflenv.com>
Sent: Friday, October 14, 2022 12:21 PM
To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>
Subject: Clinton Landfill Methane
Daphne,
Clinton Landfill currently has a 3rd party electrical generation plant at the facility that produces 3000 kw of power from landfill gas. It has been in operations for approximately 15 years. If you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Thanks
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Greg Landess shared an article on Vertical Solar PV's with members from F&S.
Questions and doubts regarding the literature review done in the past week were discussed including a capstone report outline highlighting the main topics of research. More research work to follow in the coming week to help familiarize with the project's background. Aparna got contact information from the transportation department of UCLA and Arizona State University to discuss the project with their transportation team as the 2 universities have achieved the Gold BFU status and hoping to get a sense of direction or any leads on this. She is also in touch with Prof. Lindsay Braun who is her capstone advisor, and Briana Barr, Thomas Valencia, and Lily Wilcock from the City of Urbana who are working on similar projects.
The idea was to bring more concepts and recommendations for a bike-friendly university to the table. We might also try to involve the Student Sustainability Committee, which uses a comprehensive evaluative process to fund a project that incorporates student involvement and an ability to spark change on campus. Aparna would help identify a cause as a part of the bike-friendly project which would also serve as a student-led project to apply for the SSC funding. An excel sheet that charts out the current status of the project were shared by Sarthak for better clarity, which also includes feedback from BFU to help plan for the future and achieve the desired goal.
Three main objectives of the proposal would be -
An overall capstone proposal that outlines the said objectives and a work plan will be shared in the upcoming week. Access to the iCAP portal will be granted soon to chart out real-time updates and minutes of meetings.
Mode Choice Survey was conducted by F&S TDM in spring 2022. Please read the attached report.
See the project update for Mode Choice Survey 2022: Analysis
The energy iCAP team met on Friday, October 7th 2022 to review the team's presentation for the campus sustainability celebration, review the team's priorities for the year, and discuss options for advancing the proposed clean energy plan and increasing procurement of renewable energy through power purchasing agreements.
Link to meeting recording: https://mediaspace.illinois.edu/media/t/1_5bh3gs4r
I, Aparna Padmakumar from the Department of Urban and Regional Planning am pursuing a master’s degree with a concentration focus in the field of transportation and currently is looking to take up a potential capstone project with the transportation iCAP team hoping to contribute to better bicycle safety/access on the UIUC campus. After multiple discussions and meetings with Sarthak Prasad, the projects that I will be helping out with would be the ‘Bicycle Friendly University Status’ and ‘Reducing Bicycle Theft on Campus’ through the months of October until May. In today’s kick-off meeting (10/3/2022) previous data, studies, and information were shared with me for better clarity and expected to go through all the previously collected information on the iCap portal. Sarthak guided me through the 2022 Bicycle Friendly University (BFU) application to achieve Gold-level BFU certification and also the Bike at Illinois website as a source of information for the second ongoing project. I am also in constant touch with the other concerned team members to note down important background information on these 2 projects for a better sense of direction before our next weekly Monday meeting’
