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Projects Updates for theme: Resilience

  2. 4-4-23 Green Food Truck Meeting with Matt Riggs

    Associated Project(s): 
    Green Food Truck Certification

    Attendance: Matt Riggs, Shreya Mahajan, Dominika Szal, Daphne Hulse

    Agenda:

    • Overview of the team's proposed interview questions for food trucks. Matt Riggs provided feedback:

      • Some food trucks share a commissary → might be useful to look into their commissary

        • Map out where the commissaries are

      • When food leaves truck, truck owners are not responsible for how its disposed (really falls on place its being consumed).

        • The truck has little incentive to fix this because it’s not their problem when it comes to how their food and containers are disposed.

      • Food trucks tend to place food in plastic bags, clam shells.

      • Ways to incentivize the proposition of sustainability:

        • Green Food Stamp, Sam's Club.

        • An effective cost analysis of changing from unsustainable materials (plastics, Styrofoam) to more sustainable (paper, cardboard). (must do before we start approaching the trucks. Look at Gordon's Food Service (this is where they buy their materials, likely).

        • Make sure to address their concerns when they bring up whether the alternative material is flimsy or keeps heat in effectively.

      • Matt thinks that food truck owners may not have a good idea of how recycling works.

      • Start off with what we want to achieve (sustainability for “to-go, take out, food truck” businesses)

        • Then go into cost analysis sheet with sustainability score.

        • “Would you be interested in joining a pilot program where we can feature your truck on a list?”

      • Meet the owners at their trucks, buy from them, and discuss during a less busy time of day.

  3. Resilience iCAP Team March Meeting

    Associated Project(s): 
    Resilience iCAP Team
    Urban Biodiversity Master Plan
    Rainwater Management Plans
    Green Infrastructure
    Utilize Carbon Credits

    Resilience iCAP Team had its virtual March meeting on Monday, March 20th, at 2 PM. Stacy Gloss gave updates on the Sustainability Economic Analysis Recommendation, which is approved by the iCAP Working Group (iWG). Afterwards, the team discussed updates on ongoing resilience-related projects. 

    Meeting minutes are attached.  

    Attached Files: 

  4. Illinois Green Economy Network is hiring

    Associated Project(s): 
    Green Jobs

    Hi all,

     

    I’m passing along a job opportunity that may be applicable to graduates of the iSEE Fellows and Environmental Leadership Programs.

     

    The Illinois Green Economy Network is hiring their next Executive Director. IGEN is a consortium of all Illinois community colleges working together to drive growth of the clean energy economy and green workforce.

    This unique approach leverages the power of a sustainability network while utilizing the deep community connections of individual colleges. IGEN provides a platform to expand the deployment of clean energy technologies, increase employment opportunities, improve environmental and human health, foster community engagement and accelerate market competitiveness. More information can be found at this link: https://www.schooljobs.com/careers/heartland/jobs/3968559/executive-director-illinois-green-economy-network-igen

     

    Please share this with your networks and feel free to share in an upcoming iSEE newsletter.

     

    Sincerely,

     

    Stacy Gloss

  6. Campus Rainwater Management Plan SSC Grant Application

    Associated Project(s): 
    Rainwater Management
    Rainwater Management Program
    Rainwater Management Plans

    Hello Student Sustainability Committee. Attached is a SSC Step 1 funding application request for the campus Rainwater Management Plan. I have also included a photo of the Boneyard Creek since it is a campus waterway and the application requested one map, graphic or picture. Please contact me with any questions and thank you for considering.

    Betsy

    Attached Files: 

  7. Big 10 & Friends Sustainability Network - Meeting Follow-up

    Associated Project(s): 
    Big Ten & Friends Sustainability

     

    Big 10 & Friends,

     

    Thank you to all those who attended the meeting on February 28th, and a special thanks to our presenting schools and affinity group leaders.  As follow-up to the meeting here are the meeting slides and draft notes.

     

    Next Meeting: June TBD. We need 2-3 more schools to volunteer to share updates at this meeting. Please let Nicole, Ken, or Tom know if you are interested. We currently have Notre Dame and UM Dearborn listed as up next. 

     

    Nominate Co-Chairs: Nicole & Ken's co-chair term is up in June. If you would like to join Tom as a co-chair for a 2-year term, please let us know. Or nominate others you think would be a good fit!

     

    Affinity Groups: As a reminder, you can sign up for affinity groups here. If you haven't already, please consider completing the Waste & GHG Benchmarking surveys linked in the draft meeting notes above. 

     

    Best,

    Nicole, Ken, & Tom

    BTAF Sustainability Network Co-Chairs

  8. Big 10 & Friends?

    Associated Project(s): 
    Big Ten & Friends Sustainability

    Hi Morgan!

     

    I hope this email finds you well, and I hope you're feeling well-prepared for Earth Month! I was wondering, what is the status of the Big10 & Friends Sustainability Network? I attended a meeting in October-ish 2022, thanks to an invitation from Meredith. But since Meredith is gone now. Do you know if the group is meeting again soon? 

     

    Alas, I'll be gone soon too, so I think this would be a great resource to get Codie plugged into. Can you help us make this happen? 

     

    Codie, I'll provide more context to you about this network during our 1:1 on Tuesday. 

     

    Thanks! 

     

    --

    Maria Maring

    ---------------------------

    Hi Maria and Codie,

     

    I’m adding Jen here, as she has been able to participate in those meetings more than me this year.  Jen, do you know how Codie can get added to the Big 10 and Friends emails/invites?

     

    Thanks,

    Morgan

    -------------------------------

     

    Hello,

     

    I will forward the contact information for the current co-chairs at Univ Michigan so that you can inquire about being added to the email list. The next general meeting is in June. Affinity groups meet separately at different times.

     

    Best,

    Jen

  10. Finalized Geothermal UTB press release attached

    Associated Project(s): 
    Geothermal Urbana-Champaign

    Hi everyone,

    Thank you all for your efforts putting this press release together. (See attached) I’ve scheduled this to publish on PRI’s website on Monday, Mar. 20th at 8:00 a.m.

    You can find drilling images here. Please give photo credit to Travis Tate.

    Please let me know if you have any questions.

    Thanks again,

     

    Tiffany

     

    Attached Files: 

  11. Single-use plastic elimination at Vanderbilt University

    Associated Project(s): 
    Big Ten & Friends Sustainability

    Hi Jen & Morgan,

     

    I’ll be putting additional notes I took onto the shared OneNote, but wanted to put it on your radar that I met with a school that has successfully eliminated almost all its single-use plastic, Vanderbilt, and they shared the overview and insights into this process:

    • Implemented fall 2019. Products are now sold in aluminum, boxes (e.g “Boxed Water”), or glass.
    • This was an initiative that Dining led (with great vigor, it sounds like).
    • Dining had the infrastructure and support to do it:
      • Reusable aluminum bottles are provided to new students each year with information about plastic reduction efforts on campus.
      • The school has many water bottle filler stations.
      • Unanimous support from the rest of the school (students, faculty, staff, admin).
    • It was not an easy transition:
      • Originally the school had Coca-Cola as the beverage partner. Coca-Cola was not on board with supplying only aluminum long-term, so when the contract ended, the school switched to Pepsi.
    • And the transition is attempting to be expanded…
      • Plastic bottles are still served to athletes at Athletics’  “nutrition centers” where the athletes eat: Gatorade bottles and sports drinks are their biggest consumption habits here. Sustainability is working on convincing their Athletics unit to get on board with this elimination. It is the student athletes who consume more single-use plastic than the fans who attend the events.
    • Dining is a huge advocate of sustainability efforts in general:
      • They’ve implemented a compost program for kitchen scraps and leftover student food at the dining halls.
      • They have a reusable to-go program.
      • At markets you can fill your own reusable bottle with bulk drinks: sparkling water, cold brew, nitro coffee.
      • They very recently piloted a bulk foods program for one of their markets (picture attached).
    • Anecdotally, the sustainability and recycling contacts I talked with think single-use water sales are down in the non-plastic materials.

     

    Not to chase a pipe dream here with eliminating plastic on our campus, but the zero waste coordinator should be an instigator, right? 😊

     

    Thank you,

    Daphne

     

    Attached Files: 

  12. Invitation to collaborate on a presentation

    Associated Project(s): 
    Illinois Geothermal Coalition

     

    I was contact by some colleagues withy Future Earth – Taipei (https://futureearth.org/about/who-we-are/international-offices/taipei-global-hub/) for a potential webinar series.  I suggested them to think about campus sustainability actions as a living laboratory and they are very intrigued by this idea.  They asked me to suggest speakers and I am thinking about Jack, Morgan and Andy.  So, I would like to ask if you are interested.  Some of their previous talk can be found at https://www.facebook.com/futureearth.org/.  All the communications and activities will be between 6pm-11pm CST due to time difference.  I am happy to have more discussion if you are interested.

     

    Presenters:

     

    Ms. Morgan White, https://fs.illinois.edu/resources/newsroom/2021/10/14/white-named-acting-director-of-the-f-s-capital-programs-division

    Mr. Jack Reicherts, https://studentengagement.illinois.edu/student-sustainability/ssc/team/reicherts/

    Dr. Andrew Stumpf, https://directory.illinois.edu/detail?userId=astumpf@illinois.edu&widgetId=15

    Dr. Ping-Yu Change, https://scholars.ncu.edu.tw/en/persons/ping-yu-chang

    Dr. Jui-Pin (Rubin) Tsai, https://www.bse.ntu.edu.tw/member?teacher_id=48&page=1

    Dr. Yu-Feng Forrrest Lin, https://directory.illinois.edu/detail?userId=yflin@illinois.edu&widgetId=15

     

    Cheers,

     

    Yu-Feng F. Lin

    Director

        Illinois Water Resources Center

    Principal Research Hydrogeologist

        Illinois State Geological Survey

    Clinical Professor

        Civil and Environmental Engineering

    Research Professor

        Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences

    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

  13. Invitation to collaborate on a presentation

    Associated Project(s): 
    Illinois Geothermal Coalition

     

    I was contact by some colleagues withy Future Earth – Taipei (https://futureearth.org/about/who-we-are/international-offices/taipei-global-hub/) for a potential webinar series.  I suggested them to think about campus sustainability actions as a living laboratory and they are very intrigued by this idea.  They asked me to suggest speakers and I am thinking about Jack, Morgan and Andy.  So, I would like to ask if you are interested.  Some of their previous talk can be found at https://www.facebook.com/futureearth.org/.  All the communications and activities will be between 6pm-11pm CST due to time difference.  I am happy to have more discussion if you are interested.

     

    Presenters:

     

    Ms. Morgan White, https://fs.illinois.edu/resources/newsroom/2021/10/14/white-named-acting-director-of-the-f-s-capital-programs-division

    Mr. Jack Reicherts, https://studentengagement.illinois.edu/student-sustainability/ssc/team/reicherts/

    Dr. Andrew Stumpf, https://directory.illinois.edu/detail?userId=astumpf@illinois.edu&widgetId=15

    Dr. Ping-Yu Change, https://scholars.ncu.edu.tw/en/persons/ping-yu-chang

    Dr. Jui-Pin (Rubin) Tsai, https://www.bse.ntu.edu.tw/member?teacher_id=48&page=1

    Dr. Yu-Feng Forrrest Lin, https://directory.illinois.edu/detail?userId=yflin@illinois.edu&widgetId=15

     

    Cheers,

     

    Yu-Feng F. Lin

    Director

        Illinois Water Resources Center

    Principal Research Hydrogeologist

        Illinois State Geological Survey

    Clinical Professor

        Civil and Environmental Engineering

    Research Professor

        Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences

    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

  14. Webinar: Ohio State University energy partnership

    Associated Project(s): 
    Big Ten & Friends Sustainability

    Below is an email exchange following a webinar with Ohio State University:

    Team,

     

    There is quite a bit of a back story to this partnership, much of which likely won’t be highlighted in the conversation tomorrow.

     

    When this partnership was announced several years ago it garnered a lot of interest because of the stated $1 billion that was coming to the University as part of this private-partnership agreement.

     

    Iowa engaged in a similar agreement a few years later, again with a stated huge “influx” of cash to the University.

     

    Suffice it to say, nothing comes for free, much less $1 billion dollars.

     

    It is not quite this simple and don’t take what I am about to say literally or without doing your own homework, but the $1 billion dollars is going to cost well over $2 billion to the University over this 50 year agreement.  My summary of this deal is that the University basically leveraged the value of future energy payments to get a bunch of cash up front. From a financial perspective, this is a really bad deal.

     

    When this deal came out, the University of Illinois was charged with looking at the viability of doing something similar. We hired a consultant to help us evaluate the merits and financing of the deal, and the result of that evaluation was that financially this was a really bad deal.

     

     

    All that being said, we are already doing much of what Ohio State is talking about doing and more.

    A big part of the Ohio State deal is investment in a new Co-Gen plant. We have been investing in our infrastructure consistently for the last 20 years and are looking actively at additional investments in the near and long term.

    The investment in buildings and energy savings have been going strong through ESCOs, building and controls upgrades, as well retro commissioning for 10+ years. Those savings continue to be re-invested resulting in more savings. We have already achieved the 25% savings and Ohio State is talking about.

     

     

    In no way I am discouraging anyone from listening to this conversation tomorrow. I am sure that there are some things that we can learn from them, but please keep in mind that there is a lot more to this agreement that I am sure will not be covered in the hour they have allotted.

     

     

    If these is additional interests in the Ohio State deal let me know and I can share more.

     

     

     

    Mike Larson

    ---------------------------------------------

     

    Hi Mike,

     

    Thanks for the information. It is great to hear your perspective and the backstory. I recollect we talked about this several years ago at a team meeting.

     

    My interest is to hear about the student and faculty collaborations.

     

    Andy

    ----------------------------------

     

    If you are interested here are the slides from the webinar yesterday. The recording will be made available later.

     

    Andy

    Attached Files: 

  16. BTAF Waste Affinity Group asks schools to input their answers into a spreadsheet

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

    Good morning BTAF,

     Hope everyone’s year is off to a good start!

    At the last BTAF Waste Affinity group meeting in October, the group members shared many exciting initiatives and programs related to recycling and waste diversion. Over the past few months, a working group has developed a comprehensive benchmarking survey to facilitate knowledge sharing and to organize program information. So, now we need your participation in the Waste Survey [redacted].

     At the suggestion of Nicole Berg, a google spreadsheet format was chosen for ease of use, as well as the ability to update the survey each year. In the link, you’ll find two tabs on the survey:

    1. Waste Survey: Broad swath of questions related to Zero Waste and Recycling, including strategic planning, outreach, waste management operational processes, waste metric tracking, procurement, athletics, organics, medicine/research labs, and surplus. This an “everything and the kitchen sink” approach to enable comparative analysis.  
    2. Diversion Rate Methodology: One question that continues to bubble up from time to time is, “What do you include in your diversion rate?” This survey tab requests that you mark a “x” next to each category that is included as diversion in your annual diversion rate report.   

     Three schools have already filled out the survey, so our hope is that it’s intuitive to follow along and to input your school’s information. If you have any clarifying questions, feel free to shoot me an email. We ask that each school completes the survey by Friday, February 13th.

     Once the data is collected, an intern will compile the data, and we will share the results in another BTAF Waste Affinity Group meeting at a date TBD—probably in March.

     Shout out to the team, including Tony Gillund (Purdue), Patrick Brown (Purdue), Daphne Hulse (Illinois), Dominika Szal (Illinois-intern), Nicole Berg (Michigan), and Alison Richardson (Michigan).

    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

  19. Coordinating Community Stormwater Management with Extension and Student Assistance

    Associated Project(s): 
    Build Resilience with Our Local Community
    Green Infrastructure
    City of Champaign Plans
    Rainwater Management Plans
    Support Regional Sustainability

    January 11, 2023

     

    A University team consisting of Brodie Dunn and Lisa Merrifield (Extension), Linda Derhak (DURP student), and Stacy Gloss met with Lacey Rains Lowe and Jeff Marino from the City of Champaign to talk about working together to coordinate rainwater management efforts. Champaign sees a gap in resources for commercial developers related to innovative stormwater management applications. The team identified stormwater utility fee incentives as a possible leverage point for developers, but current incentives do not seem to be sufficient. Linda will begin to inventory cities with stormwater utility fees for innovative practices for engaging commercial developers. Brodie will propose revisions to the approved plant and tree list for Champaign to encourage use of native and more beneficial non-native plant species. Lisa will reach out to planners from Urbana and Savoy and will schedule a meeting for mid-February to discuss progress and identify next steps.

  20. Resilience iCAP Team January Meeting

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

    Resilience iCAP Team had its first virtual meeting of the Spring 2023 semester on Tuesday, January 10th, at 10:30 AM. Cheryl Bicknell is the new Facilities & Services representative of the team. At the meeting, the Biodiversity Master Plan project student intern Gabriel Harper-Hagen gave a brief overview of the biodiversity plan and shared his progress through an extensive update document. Afterward, the team discussed its goals for this semester. 

    The full recording of the meeting can be found here

    Meeting minutes are attached. 

    Attached Files: 

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