F&S co-hosted a Geo-Power Hour for Geothermal Urbana-Champaign
12/15/20 Geo Power Hour on Zoom Co-host: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign: Facilities & Services
12/15/20 Geo Power Hour on Zoom Co-host: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign: Facilities & Services
12/07/20 Geo Power Hour on Zoom Co-host: University of Illinois Extension Master Naturalists
12/01/20 Geo Power Hour on Zoom Co-host: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign: Facilities & Services
11/19/20 Geo Power Hour on Zoom Co-host: Champaign County Sustainability Network (CCNet)
11/11/2020 Geo Power Hour on Zoom Co-host: Illinois State Geological Survey Prairie Research Institute
Sinead Soltis (F&S intern) presented an overview of the SmartWay Program to Dan Hiser of F&S Transportation & Automotive Services. Representing the department, Dan was very excited to be a part of this conversation and offered helpful suggestions for having a suscessful campus rollout. Adding the SmartWay logo to the keychains of the cars used for carpooling, along with adding it to his own signature were some of the many suggestions offered. We plan to also collaborate with F&S Transportation in the future to add the importance of our affiliate status in this program in the training for new employees within the department and throughout the whole campus staff.
See the attached pdf for presentation slides.
Sinead Soltis and Morgan White of F&S Sustainability presented an overview of the SmartWay Program to different members of the Illini Union staff. The meeting included: Dave Guth (Illini Union Director of Operations), Tod Petrie(Director of Illini Union Bookstore), Erik Riha (Illini Union Marketing Director), and Todd Moeglich (Illini Union Asst. Director for Procurement). An engaging discussion led to ideas of where the SmartWay program can be shared to staff members across the Illini Union, along with the importance of our affiliate status as a model to the community.
See the attached pdf for presentation slides.
Sinead Soltis (F&S intern) presented an overview of the SmartWay Program to Travis Molitor of F&S Stores and Receiving. Collaboration on the topic will hopefully include affiliate recognition on their new website, along with physical signage outside of PPSB Stores & Receiving. In addition to this recognition, Travis plans to discuss with his staff about our status in this program.
See the attached pdf for presentation slides.
Also, Travis recommends reaching out to Housing Storekeepers and Chem. Sciences contacts.
The following email was sent on November 16, 2020 to the RLF Selection Committee:
Revolving Loan Fund Selection Committee,
I want to thank everybody again for your participation in the previous selection process. With the completion of that vote, the RLF fund source still has approximately $300,000+ available and a time sensitive submission from DIA has been received recently. The project being submitted is for a Retro-Commissioning (RCx) effort at the State Farm Center. RCx efforts see great results under normal operating conditions, but with the pandemic, significant savings could be realized now that many events are being cancelled and the facility is not being utilized at its full capacity. The request is for $250K and could see a payback of less than 2 years. Please see the attached document for more information.
We don’t necessarily need to score this project, all we need is a majority decision (yes or no) to approve.
I ask that you please reply with your individual yes (in support of funding) or no (decline funding approval) votes before November 26, 2020 (10 days away).
... Thank you again for your continued support of the RLF program.
See the attached file to read details about the Retro-Commissioning (RCx) for the State Farm Center.
Sinead Soltis, as an F&S Sustainability intern, presented the new SmartWay Program to Meredith Moore and Jenna Kurtzweil at iSEE. The iSEE reps were very supportive of the program roll-out and had great suggestions for additional contacts to share the information with, such as the Engagement SWATeam.
See the attached pdf for presentation slides.
The attached proposal is for funding from the Revolving Loan Fund to do RCx at the State Farm Center. This project is expected to cost $250,000 and pay for itself in energy savings within two years of completion.
Discussions continue in regards to University of Illinois System's EPA SmartWay affiliation status. Kate Yoshida, UIC Program Director of Sustainability, met with Morgan White and Sinead Soltis to brainstorm departments across both campuses that would benefit from learning more about the SmartWay program. Morgan and Sinead shared their plans to present to iSEE, F&S Transportation, the Illini Union, and other relevant departments that will assist in recognizing our status of being an affiliate.
F&S Sustainability reached out to Cindy Ervin, the University of Illinois-Springfield Transportation Supervisor, about our system's status as a SmartWay member. Attached is the letter sent to share this information, along with other important resources on getting involved as a SmartWay partner along with its benefits.
Morgan White shared the SmartWay Affiliate program information with Cindy Klein-Banai at the University of Illinois- Chicago(UIC)
Morgan White and Sinead Soltis met with Katherine Yoshida, the University of Illinois-Chicago's Sustainabiliy program director about our system's status of being an EPA SmartWay Affiliate. Discussion included the history of SmartWay on our campus, along with ideas of how to integrate into UIC's campus.
A follow up call is scheduled for the end of October.
Attached are the final project selection results for this year's Revolving Loan Fund, via Joshua Whitson. A big thanks to everyone who submitted projects and to those who support the Revolving Loan Fund.
7 projects were approved during the FY2020 Revolving Loan Fund (RLF) project selection. At this time, final scoring results were determined as well. F&S will be beginning these projects soon and will start assessing their correlated utility savings.
Due to COVID-19, the voting process was conducted via email as opposed to meeting in person. As a result of the success in the virtual voting process, future selections are planned to occur in a similar fashion.
The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is now a registered SmartWay Affiliate! The EPA SmartWay Affiliate Agreement was signed on 6/19/20, and the university was officially welcomed to the program by a representative from the EPA on 7/16/20. Civil Engineering student Abby Culloton and F&S Sustainability Intern Sinead Soltis will begin integrating the SmartWay messaging within campus departments beginning in the fall 2020 semester.
A SmartWay Affiliate is an organization that agrees to educate and support their members' efforts to improve freight sustainability. Please follow the link below for more information and to explore how your team can become a SmartWay partner!
"Why doesn't the company installing the solar panels at U of I put them over the parking lot? I would provide shade for the cars underneath and would eliminate having to kill whatever would be underneath them in the fields."
The best option for building solar panels is ground-mounted, said Morgan White, the associate director for sustainability at the University of Illinois.
"As part of our Climate Leadership Commitments the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has a goal of producing at least 25,000 megawatt-hours (MWh) per year from on-campus solar," she said. "When we evaluated options for meeting this goal, rooftop solar, solar over parking areas, and ground-mounted solar were all considered. The most cost-effective option is ground-mounted solar, and it also allows for larger-scale installations.
"For a sense of the scale, the two solar farms will be a total of 75 acres, while the largest parking lot on campus is less than 15 acres.
"When installing solar panels over parking areas, there are additional infrastructure and labor costs to raise the solar panels above the ground level. Although we do not currently have any solar over parking areas, Facilities & Services is working with the Parking Department to evaluate potential locations for a pilot installation. We are also continuing to install rooftop solar on individual buildings."
Solar panels are on the following five Urbana campus buildings:
— Business Instructional Facility
— the Activities & Recreation Center
— Wassaja Residence Hall
— University High School Gymnasium
— Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Building.
"I'd also like to emphasize that the ground-mounted solar panels do not harm the plants under them. After building the first Solar Farm, we learned that there was an excellent opportunity for growing useful plants under and around the panels," said White. "This is a great opportunity for creating a multi-functional ecosystem, with pollinator supportive plants and protected areas for small animals and insects."
Final Project Deliverables for Spring 2020
There were 7 projects completed by the WIE-GFX Abroad Scholars in the Spring 2020 semester of ENG 177