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  1. Agri-Voltic PPA

    Associated Project(s): 
    Agrivoltaics: Crop Production and Solar Panels on the Same Land

    Below is an email from Tony Spurlock:

    Ben,

     

    Attached is a summary of UIUC’s response to Legal Concerns with PEI entering into the PPA related to the Agri-voltaics project.

     

    Mike,

     

    We do not see any hard cost savings from having PEI do the PPA as opposed to University Purchasing, but we would expect PEI to be able to get it done more efficiently its greater flexibility and expertise in procuring energy commodities.  The timing for this project is critical to be able to do the research as planned.

     

    Regards,

     

    Tony

    Attached Files: 

  4. Multiple schools (OSU, UMich, Purdue) begin involvement with the creation of the survey

    Associated Project(s): 
    Big Ten & Friends Sustainability
    Achieve Zero Waste

    Thank you Mary and Daphne!  The way that Mary worded the question is great to me! 

     

    Daphne, if it is not too bold of me to ask, I was wondering if there might be opportunities to add more questions to the Survey?  I ask as I was recently emailing with the Michigan folks (copied) and both our institutions are interested in pulling together some waste related benchmarking data, specifically around their individual waste goals and how they measure it (hence the diversion rate calculation question).  I am hoping that there is a way we might be able to collaborate, whether that is collaborating through your current survey or perhaps supplementing the data.  That being said, I know very little about the survey, its timeline, the questions, etc.; thus, a collaboration may not be feasible. If you believe a collaboration might be feasible, I would be happy to coordinate a quick schedule where we could discuss how Purdue staff and/or students could assist.  I am interested to hear your thoughts!

     

    Thank you,

    Tony

     

    From: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
    Sent: Wednesday, October 19, 2022 8:43 AM
    To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>
    Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>; Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>
    Subject: RE: Big Ten Waste Management Survey: Diversion Rate Calculation

     

    ---- External Email: Use caution with attachments, links, or sharing data ----

     

    Daphne,

     

    Apologies for the delay- I was out of the office last week and am still getting caught up.

     

    Thank you so much for including that question in your survey!

     

    One item might be to ask, “What information do you include in your diversion rate report?”

     

    Ohio State includes the following:

    Landfill tonnage data

    Commingled recycling

    Reused pallets

    Recycled pallets

    Scrap metal

    Landscape waste

    Composted food scraps, biodegradable materials, coffee grounds, and animal bedding from labs

    Biodigested food waste (ex. enviropure systems)

    Donations of furniture and other items

    Motor oil

    Tire Recycling

    Cooking oil recycling

    Donated food

    Mattresses

    Paper shredding

    Batteries

    Recycled toner cartridges

    Donated books

    Reprocessed medical devices

     

    We do not include construction waste or manure from farms. We also do not estimate avoided materials (ex. weights kept out of landfill through projects like implementing hand dryers or reusable containers). Instead, we just assume those numbers will be kept out of the landfill data.

     

    I’m looping in Tony to make sure I got to the hear of his question. Please let me know if you need anything else! Mary

     

    Mary Leciejewski
    Zero Waste Manager

    Pronouns: She/Her/Hers 

    Facilities Operations and Development, Sustainability & Strategic Services
    1130 Service Building Annex | 2578 Kenny Road, Columbus, OH 43210
    (O) 614.292.3637
    fod.osu.edu/sustainability

     

     

     

     

     

    From: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>
    Sent: Tuesday, October 11, 2022 11:58 AM
    To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
    Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
    Subject: Big Ten Waste Management Survey: Diversion Rate Calculation

     

    Hi Mary, It was great to meet with you and the other Big Ten schools last week! Per the request to include the diversion rate calculation as a part of the comprehensive survey, could I inquire about OSU’s process? ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍

     

    Hi Mary,

     

    It was great to meet with you and the other Big Ten schools last week! Per the request to include the diversion rate calculation as a part of the comprehensive survey, could I inquire about OSU’s process?

     

    Thank you,

     

    Daphne

     

    Daphne Hulse (she/her)
    Zero Waste Coordinator
    Facilities & Services | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
    +1 (217) 333-7550 |     dlhulse2@illinois.edu
     
     

  6. Weekly Update: Strong Towns, Bike Summit, potentially postponing Working Bikes

    Associated Project(s): 
    Campus Bike Center

    All, Last week was a busy one. We had Strong Towns talk on Tuesday and the Illinois Bike Summit on Wednesday. Got in some good networking, heard some interesting talks/discussions, and got buzzed by two MTD buses on my bike commute there and then one car on my ride back to the Bike Center. Oh, the irony.

    The cooler weather has curtailed our visitors, but we’ve had a few volunteers, too—always nice.

    Grabbed some bikes from the warehouse last week and will continue to do so as I can this week. I have jury duty potentially all this week and next week, which majorly mucks up my plans for setting up with Working Bikes since I can’t plan past day-to-day. Likely will have to bump that to early November unless circumstances change.

    The numbers:

    Visitors: 42
    Sales: $266
    Memberships: 3 for $90
    Tires/tubes: 3 for $20

    Thanks!

    Jacob Benjamin
    Campus Bike Center Coordinator

  7. Campus Sustainability Celebration - 10/17/22

    Associated Project(s): 
    Campus Sustainability Month
    Student Sustainability Leadership Council (SSLC)
    Student Sustainability Committee (SSC)
    Energy iCAP Team
    Education iCAP Team
    Resilience iCAP Team
    Land and Water iCAP Team
    Transportation iCAP Team
    Zero Waste iCAP Team
    iCAP Working Group (iWG)
    Certified Greener Campus Programs
    iCAP 2020: Illinois Climate Action Plan

    The 2022 Campus Sustainability Celebration was a huge success! Thank you to all who participated! The PowerPoint presentation is attached, and the agenda for the event was as follows:

    • 3-3:15 PM – Welcome
      • Jennifer Fraterrigo, on behalf of Director Madhu Khanna (iSEE)
      • Chancellor Jones
      • Vice Chancellor Susan Martinis (OVCRI)
    • 3:15 – 3:30 PM – Holistic initiatives
      • Plastic reduction (Jen)
      • Clean energy/Solar Farm 3 (Morgan)
      • Greener Campus Program (Meredith)
    • 3:30 – 4:40 PM – iCAP Team presentations
      • Energy
      • Transportation
      • Land and Water
      • Zero Waste
      • Education
      • Engagement
      • Resilience
    • 4:40 – 5 PM – Student groups (SSLC, SSC) – Jack Reicherts and Maiah Caise
      • Closing remarks by Jennifer Fraterrigo (on behalf of Madhu Khanna)
    • 5 – 6 PM – Celebration - refreshments, roundtable forum with each iCAP Team, student tabling session  
    Attached Files: 

  8. Campus Sustainability Month Activities - Oct 2022

    Associated Project(s): 
    Campus Sustainability Month
    Campus Sustainability Month - Waste Reduction Challenge
    Clean up campus
    Student Sustainability Leadership Council (SSLC)
    Student Sustainability Committee (SSC)
    TED Talk: Eco Edition Series
    Students for Environmental Concerns (SECS)

    One of our favorite times of the year is almost here… Campus Sustainability Month! Below is a highlight of major events and programs happening this October, though check out the iSEE Sustainability Calendar for the full list. This is the perfect time to take action and show your support for environmental consciousness (and the Illinois Climate Action Plan!). I look forward to seeing you across campus!

     

    • Plastic Reduction Challenge: Are you up to the challenge? From October 3–30, we provide the resources and point system to help you track your plastic use each week and find sustainable alternatives. The point system and fillable grid are attached, and additional information will be sent out prior to the start of the challenge. Take part with this fun and interactive community, and earn the chance to win a sustainability prize pack. It is easy to make a positive impact! Sign up here for the challenge.
       
    • Clothing Swap: This is the perfect opportunity to donate your clothing items and update your wardrobe! Join iSEE, SECS, and SSLC for this reduce/reuse event at the Channing Murray Foundation on Tuesday, October 11. Drop off clothes at Channing Murray the day before, or during the event itself from 10AM – 3PM.  All are welcome to drop off and/or participate (it’s free!).
       
    • Green Quad Day: Come check out the variety of student, staff, faculty, and community-led environmental groups on Thursday, October 13 from 11AM – 3PM at the Anniversary Plaza (cement area between the Quad and Union). This is a great opportunity to talk with and learn about the many sustainability efforts on campus. The rain date is October 17. If you are interested in representing your organization at a table, sign up here.
       
    • Water Taste Test: It’s 2022 – why are we still drinking from plastic bottles? Let’s put our tap water to the test and see, blindly, which water we prefer. Check out the iSEE table at Green Quad Day (above) and see if you can taste a difference between bottled water and tap! In the meantime, take our drinking water behavior survey (and win a chance for a $50 gift card).
       
    • Illini Lights Out: Join us to shut off lights in buildings around campus to save energy and reduce the environmental impact of our massive university! Meet at 5:30PM in the lobby of the Foreign Language Building on Friday, October 14 to receive brief instructions before heading out to turn off lights in assigned buildings. Come back to FLB (roughly 6:30) when you are done to turn in your clipboard, get a snack, and pat yourself on the back for helping to save so much energy! Register here, and come by yourself or bring a friend!
       
    • Campus Sustainability Celebration: All are welcome to attend this annual event on Monday, October 17 from 3-6PM at NCSA (auditorium and lobby), 1205 W. Clark St., Urbana. The first two hours will be spent in the Auditorium, where we will hear from campus sustainability leaders and from the iCAP Teams. Following the presentations (5-6 PM), each iCAP Team will have a table in the lobby/atrium area for roundtable discussion, suggestions, and a Q&A. Student environmental groups will have tables set up and together, we will enjoy conversation, light refreshments, and cake!
       
    • Trash Cleanup: Help keep our campus beautiful! On Wednesday, October 19, meet at Alma Mater at 4PM and join us to collect trash and recycling around campus until 5:30PM.
       
    • TED Talk: Eco-Edition Series: Tune in to this edition of iSEE’s ongoing Zoom series on Wednesday, October 26 from 7 – 8PM. Our host this month is Lucy Nifong, a senior in Agricultural and Consumer Economics, iSEE Communications Intern, and Vice Chair Internal of the Student Sustainability Committee. Participants will view a prerecorded TED Talk, followed by a guided discussion and roundtable on Campus Sustainability Month! Sign up here.
       
    • Sustainability BINGO: Fill out the iSEE board (attached) for a chance to win prizes! The board (PDF) includes sustainability-related activities and initiatives you can do across campus during Sustainability Month (Oct. 1-31). Make sure you document and let us know which actions you completed using the Google Form to be eligible for the prize drawing.
       
    • Have you gotten your office, event, or Greek chapter certified as Green yet? It’s easy to be sustainable! Get certified and be recognized!

  9. F&S, North American, and Essity introduction

    Associated Project(s): 
    Green Cleaning Products and Practices

    Hi Pete, Macie and Daphne!

     

    We were excited last week for you to hear more about the Circularity and paper recycling program that Essity has been utilizing in other areas of the world. Bryan from Essity would like to get his colleague, Mike Kapalko, on a call together to discuss this opportunity further with University of Illinois! Daphne, if Pete and Macie haven’t filled you in, this is an opportunity to use current paper recycling on campus and have it be used to create paper product with Essity. We can inch closer to Zero Waste on campus!

     

    Please let us know if there are dates and times the week of October 31st to set up a Zoom call. Perhaps an hour or so.

     

    Thanks in advance and we are excited to discuss this in more detail and see what next steps would look like!

     

    Regards,

    Zach

     

  10. Week 3 - Check in meeting

    Associated Project(s): 
    Bicycle Friendly University Status
    Reduce Bicycle Theft on Campus
    Independent Student Projects

    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.

  12. RECs & Carbon Offsets for Scope 1, 2, 3 Emissions

    Associated Project(s): 
    Carbon Offsets for Major Users
    Develop Local Carbon Offset Program

    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:

    • North American Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) 
    • International Renewable Energy Certificates (I-RECs)
    • North American Carbon Offsets (CO2)
    • International Carbon Offsets (CO2)
    • DirtRoad Electric Vehicle Charging - turnkey, revenue-positive electric vehicle infrastructure 
    • DirtRoad ESG - Carbon offsets from our DirtRoad platform - at a ten-year fixed price - an excellent alternative for the recently introduced SEC carbon disclosure rules

    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,

    Attached Files: 

  13. Clinton, IL landfill (owned by Green For Life)

    Associated Project(s): 
    Use Landfills with Methane-capture Technology

    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

     

     


    David Bryant | Landfill General Manager I

    GFL Environmental

    24501 McMullen Rd, Hopedale, IL 61747
    | david.bryant@gflenv.com | www.gflenv.com

    Confidentiality Notice:  This email message (including attachments, if any) is intended for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is privileged, proprietary, confidential and exempt from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify the sender and erase this email message immediately.

  14. Information on moving bees around for commercial agriculture

    Associated Project(s): 
    Bee Campus USA

    Information about how commercial bee keeping functions and its impact to overall bee populations was inquired about by Brent Lewis, Landscape Architect. Below is the response from Adam Donzel, an Assistant Professor in Entomology. 

    'Hi Brent,

     

    Yeah, there is work on that.  Here are links to couple studies about it:

     

    https://www.nature.com/articles/srep32023

    https://academic.oup.com/jinsectscience/article/22/1/17/6523145

     

    Basically, yes, there are some stresses involved with migratory beekeeping but sedentary colonies can also have similar issues. In some scenarios, migratory colonies could be healthier as they are moved to areas with good nutritional resources all the time, while those left in place have to deal with times of low food availability. In reality, though, migratory colonies do undergo a lot of stress as they are used to pollinate crops and a lot goes into that - the stress of confinement, heat, exposure to agrochemicals, etc. From a beekeeping perspective, this is calculated into the fees charged for pollination (to some extent at least). Right now, beekeepers charge about $200/hive to pollinate almonds for example (the most lucrative pollination event). Big beekeepers manage 20,000-50,000 hives!  "Small" commercial beekeepers usually have 2-5000.

     

    Migratory beekeeping uses about 85% of the managed colonies in the USA (incredible!). One big issue with this is that, if a new pest or pathogen is introduced, it will be spread throughout the country very fast. And in big pollination events, like almonds, hives are concentrated at very high densities, which does present a lot of opportunities for spreading diseases. They do mitigate this to some extent, however, as there are health checks required to move bees across state lines, and almond growers usually require checks of colonies to make sure they are healthy.

     

    Hope this helps - always happy to answer questions when I can!"

     

     

  16. Week 2 update: Objectives for capstone

    Associated Project(s): 
    Bicycle Friendly University Status
    Reduce Bicycle Theft on Campus
    Independent Student Projects

    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 -

    1. To get the BFU application drafted and ready to submit by the month of May
    2. Ideas for SSC funding for the Bike Friendly University Project
    3. Educate students and create a plan for bike thefts so that incoming students are aware of how to protect their bikes and encourage them to use this mode of transportation.

    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.

  18. Resilience iCAP Team October 2022 Meeting

    Associated Project(s): 
    Resilience iCAP Team
    Urban Biodiversity Master Plan

    The Resilience iCAP Team had its second monthly online meeting on Monday, October 10th from 11:00 - 12:00 PM. The team worked on the Campus Sustainability Celebration slides, got updates on Urban Biodiversity Master Plan, talked about sustainability and resilience challenges at Urbana and Savoy areas, and shared announcements on upcoming sustainability events! Meeting minutes are attached. 

     

     

    Attached Files: 

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