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Projects Updates for theme: all

  1. Join the Plastic Free Challenge this October!

    Associated Project(s): 
    Plastic Free Challenge
    Campus Sustainability Month

    Join the Plastic Free Challenge!

    Take part in our zero waste journey! Participate in the Plastic Free Challenge during Campus Sustainability Month this October. From October 3–30, we provide the resources and point system to help you track your plastic use each week and find sustainable alternatives. Take part and earn the chance to win a sustainability prize pack. It’s easy to make a positive impact! Sign up for the challenge.

    October 3–30 • Map

    Meredith Moore • Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment

    baseline_wifi_black_18dp.png This opportunity is available online.

  2. New iSEE Green Event and Green Office Certification

    Associated Project(s): 
    Certified Greener Campus Programs
    Certified Green Office Program (CGOP)
    Certified Green Event Program

    Congratulations to the newest recipients of the Green Office and Green Event Certification programs!

    Green Event:

    iSEE Illini Lights Out, Certified September 2022

    Illini Lights Out is a series of reoccurring events (Sept. 23, Oct. 14, Nov. 11, Dec. 2) where students volunteer to turn off lights in academic buildings around campus. They are saving energy and promoting sustainability in the progress!

    Green Office:

    University Library Conservation Lab, Gold Certified September 2022

    The University Library Conservation Lab is gold certified with 34 elective actions taken! They notably upgraded their photo documentation lights from incandescent bulbs to LED rated, and the LED lights came from another section of Preservation Services where they were no longer in use. 

    Keep up the great work!

  3. Bicycle Retrieval for abandoned bicycles: Completed

    Associated Project(s): 
    Collection and Donation of Abandoned Bicycles

    The bicycle retrieval for abandoned bicycles that were impounded over the summer 2022 has completed, as of September 23, 2022. We had collected nearly 500 bicycles over the summer, and 24 bicycles were retrieved by the owners. The remaining bicycles will be donated to the Bike Project of Urbana-Champaign and Campus Bike Center for refurbishment, resale, and recycle. Nearly 60% of these unclaimed bicycle will be donated to Working Bikes, a not-for-profit bike shop which fixes up old cycles for sale or to be donated to global communities.

  4. Final numbers from Bike to Work Day and Light the Night

    Associated Project(s): 
    C-U Bike to Work Day
    Light the Night

    The Bike Month Planning team organized Bike to Work Day on September 14, 2022 from 7 - 10 am at 16 Champaign County locations, including eight on-campus. There were 893 registered to attend before the event this year and nearly 150 people registered on-site during the event! Champaign County Bikes were also present at Alma Mater and Hallene Gateway during Light the Night event as well as Bike to Market Day on September 17, 2022, to meet attendees who could not attend the Bike to Work Day event. The final number of pre-registered attendees (prior to Bike to Market) was 921, which is a new record for this event!

    Light the Night was organized on September 15, 2022, from 4 - 7 pm at three campus locations - Alma Mater, Hallene Gateway, and Campus Bike Center. This year, we used Planet Bike blinky lights with silicone straps. We distributed and installed nearly 800 bike light sets during this event! Alma Mater was, by far, the most popular location, where nearly 575 lights were distributed.

    Following the event, the Bike Month Plannign team discussed options for next year.

  5. Next steps from NRES285 spring report

    Associated Project(s): 
    NRES 285: iCAP Sustainability Ambassadors

    Karl Radnitzer (Associate Director at Uni High) responded to the spring 2022 NRES285 final report with the following action items and requests at the end of June 2022.

    =================

    I have included Don Marrow (our Business manager) and Elizabeth Majerus ( our Director of the School). The part in red is where is where we need money to complete the projects Don and Elizabeth.

    I have read the report. I want to do the following:

    1. I will have 8 paper recycle containers on each floor- clearing marked. Should I spray paint them green or blue?
    2. Make sure all black containers are for garbage/trash only so we don't find contamination in all recycling bins.
    3. The issue with the steel door our previous business manager wanted the wooden doors.  Didn't have much say
    4. I would like all lights motions to switched to sensor LED. Don how do we make that happen?
    5. We realize our windows are not very effective. We need a complete overhaul of our windows.
    6. We did have a group talk to us about food recycling, but they wanted to do the composting inside the building. That was not going to work.
    7. On the land section, I have a boy scout do his eagle project on the area right outside the door on Springfield so that it now looks much better. We also have a club taking care of the small garden.
    8. Don, how can we get more sensor water bottle filters on each floor.. We have one on third, we need on second near 206 and one near 106 N.

  6. iCAP Portal Admin Meeting - September 23, 2022

    Associated Project(s): 
    Sustainability iCAP Portal

    Michael's updates:

    TODOs:

    • Track down and resolve informational message on full listing page for Project Updates by Key Objective (see, e.g. Projects Updates for key objective: 1.0 iCAP 2020 Illinois Climate Action Plan)
    • Why is the Achieve Zero Waste project map page not loading?
    • Discuss metrics at next meeting
      • Metrics with lots of data
      • Consider how to handle old metrics that no longer track new data. Archive somehow?
      • Fun with math (e.g. combining multiple metrics)
    • Reorganize Collections pages
      • Keep project listing in top left
      • Move map to lower left
      • Move Updates to top right, show 5-7
      • Keep Hierarchy in lower right, link to hierarchy in separate page rather than loading in current page to speed up page loading time
    • Related Files section on project pages: show as list rather than cards, add spacing between items, remove bullet points

  7. TED Talk: Eco-Edition Series - Geothermal Energy

    Associated Project(s): 
    TED Talk: Eco Edition Series [ARCHIVED]

    We are very appreciative of Dr. Andrew Stumpf and Dr. Tugce Baser for leading the discussion on geothermal energy on 9-19-22. Please see the attached PowerPoint presentation for an overview of the information provided during the event. Below are additional resources and opportunities to get further involved on the topic:

    Mark your calendars for our October TED Talk in celebration of Campus Sustainability Month! Lucy Nifong, senior undergraduate student in Agricultural and Consumer Economics, will host the conversation on 10/26 at 7 PM. Register here!

    Be sure to check out the full list of sustainability events on the iSEE calendar.

    Attached Files: 

  9. Proposal for Creation of a Team

    Associated Project(s): 
    EPA RainWorks Challenge

    Art Schmidt from Civil and Environmental Engineering, reached out to faculty and students urging them to create a team made up of individuals from different disciplines/departments for the Rainworks Challenge. UIUC won this design competition in 2017 and Schmidt credits this success to the fact that the winning team was made up by many disciplines across campus. Schmidt explains that he is willing to serve as a faculty advisor for this challenge. 

    Brent Lewis, Brian Chaille, CEE students and other individuals expressed great interest in creating this team. Associate Professor in Landscape Architecture, Mary Pat McGuire asked the following questions:

    How can we use the competition to advance actual implementation of GSI here on campus? Do we need to identify funding to support implementation? Should we start a campaign for alum donations for implementation of projects? Can we revisit the 2015 2nd place winning master plan to explore the viability of that plan, and to add to it? Can we revisit the 2017 1st place winning design and explore the implementation of that proposal? What does a future 2022 winning proposal want to achieve for our campus that is new or different from those previous wins - and how can we get everyone on board with implementation?

  10. iWG Meeting 9-9-22

    Associated Project(s): 
    iCAP Working Group (iWG)
    Education iCAP Team
    Encourage Bicycle Use

    The iCAP Working Group met on 9-9-22 and discussed the following agenda. The meeting minutes are attached. 

    1. Introductions
    2. Reminder of our role on the iWG
    3. Edu006 Sustainability in Study Abroad: https://icap.sustainability.illinois.edu/project-update/edu006-sustainability-study-abroad-submitted
    4. Edu007 Big10 Green Career Fair: https://icap.sustainability.illinois.edu/project-update/edu007-big10-green-career-fair-submitted
    5. Bike program/bike registration free
    Attached Files: 

  11. Insider article on 9/21/22: Ahead of the Curve and All Electric

    Associated Project(s): 
    Use Electric Vehicles (EV)
    F&S Sustainable Fleet Plan
    Decrease Emissions from UI Fleet
    Increase use of EVs and other Alternative Service Vehicles

    F&S purchased two all electric Ford F-150 Lightning trucks in spring 2022. Read the Insider article about this here: https://fs.web.illinois.edu/Insider/2022/09/21/ahead-of-the-curve-and-al...

    Attached Files: 

  12. 9-21-22 External Meeting

    Associated Project(s): 
    "Don't Waste" with Coca-Cola

    On September 21, UIUC sustainability representatives met with Coca-Cola and discussed the following:

    Attendance: Sarah Carten, Liz Doeschot, Jen Fraterrigo, Dave Guth, Daphne Hulse, Shreya Mahajan, Meredith Moore, Shawn Patterson, Jake Slager, Tyler Swanson, Nicole Tate

    • External ,eeting cadence: weekly or biweekly call with the high-level team, and a monthly call with everyone.

    • Did Morgan move forward with the spreadsheet of UIUC and Coca-Cola contacts:

      • Meredith: it probably hasn’t been completed.

      • Daphne will complete it.

    • Zero waste athletic events (Mercedes Benz stadium is best in class, zero waste in all facets, Atlanta Falcon):

      • Bins and messaging need to be consistent.

      • Journey there is very similar to here. It started with a waste audit and Circular Solutions for a closed loop system:

        • Circular Solutions will get far more technical than Coca-Cola will get.

      • Start off with a zero waste event, and use them as a blueprint. Their goal was a huge marquee zero waste event (March 2020 March Madness).

        • This event didn’t happen. But the time during the pandemic allowed them to work towards it incrementally.

      • Awarded zero waste in June 2022.

    • For a zero waste event, consistent branding is going to be the most important part:

      • University of Washington (PAC-12 sustainability award).

        • Turn towards the student body for support, it is much more impactful (not self-serving activation, more engaging).

        • 2 full-time interns that focused on this programming.

          • Leveraged email blasts, athletic websites, season ticket holders to let them know in advance.

          • Created hashtag and shared results after (#CougsGoGreen).

          • Engaged student groups who volunteered to help with execution at informational tables (driving guest awareness, giving sustainable swag, helping with sorting after the events).

          • Opportunity to share videos? Amplify what is happening on campus already.

          • Zero waste plan:

            • Short-term: reach out to student orgs with a need for community service hours (sorority, fraternity, student gov?).

            • Long-term: Circular Solutions could identify gaps in sorting infrastructure and how to address the gaps.

        • Tackle concessions: most visible part of the operation, and it creates a lot of waste by nature.

    • Feedback:

      • Jen: challenge is athletics not at the table. We don’t know if they are on board. We don’t necessarily have a good relationship with them at this point in time.

        • Nicole: this is not so unusual. There are a few partners with great cross-functional collaboration on campus. But everyone has different goals, different business units.

          • Recommendations: if the passion is around making it an athletic event (engage students, make an impact), step one might be identifying one point person at athletics to be the “yes”-er not even the “do”-er. If you can position this as “you can save time and energy if you allow us to set forth this plan on our end” can be a convincing point to keep them out of the minutiae of the planning. A second option is to start with a marquee student life event, than a marquee athletic event (convocation, commencement, bid day for Greek organizations)

    • Earth Day would allow us a longer lead time.

    • Jake will have a conversation with Marty tomorrow about this.

      • Meanwhile, we can try with the Athletics Board.

    • Footprint: inside or outside of the event for a green team (swag, green team, get caught green handed).

    • In venue messaging: throughout the course of the game, can there be half-time message, every x number of minutes or hours for a brief message? What can the DIA offer us?

      • Digital signage.

    • Heaviest lift: strong recycling infrastructure.

    • Ryan Squire: Executive in the DIA.

    • Don’t Waste It history: concept was ideated 18 months ago. Trademark review and it passed. Ran it through trademark again, some other company in the last 18 months decided to use it.

     

  13. Scope Change and Extension request approved

    Associated Project(s): 
    Dump and Run
    Student Sustainability Committee (SSC)

    From: Student Sustainability Committee 
    Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2022 2:31 PM
    To: White, Morgan
    Cc: recycling@illinois.edu; Varney, Peter W 
    Subject: Re: Extension request for Dump and Run

     

    Hi All,

     

    This Scope Change was approved! Sorry for the late response!

     

    Please let us know if any additional information is needed on our end!

     

    Best,

     

    SSC

  17. Weekly Update: BTWD, LTN, Build-a-Bike, very busy this week

    Associated Project(s): 
    Campus Bike Center
    C-U Bike to Work Day
    Light the Night
    Collection and Donation of Abandoned Bicycles

    All, Real busy times last week. Shop was manageably busy, but we had BTWD and LTN on consecutive days. Both events went well. I spent more time at the DRES stop than the Bike Center station, which was a new experience. Lots of folks on that route, and I was able to talk route-planning and commuting strategy with some people new to commuting. Weather cooperated swimmingly.

    We had a deluge of completed B-a-Bs last week. Always good to see the smiling faces of rewarded effort. Marketing folks came by and updated some of our filing cabinets and bins with printed (legible) labels and photos of contents to better help people find and identify parts. We’re still slower on Tue/Thurs as we work to get the word out that we’re now open those days as well.

    We’ll work this week on a couple shop builds we’ve been too busy to finish, prep for the abandoned bike giveaway, and clean shop as we’ve been too busy to do much of any of that in the last two weeks.

    The numbers:

    Visitors: 86
    Sales: $1,084.30
    Bikes (B-a-B): 3 for $150

    Memberships: 17 for $510
    Tires/tubes: 10 for $59

    Thanks!

    Jacob Benjamin
    Campus Bike Center Coordinator

  18. Waste Transfer Station Tour and Plastics Request

    Associated Project(s): 
    Sculptures
    Achieve Zero Waste

    Deke Weaver, Professor in the School of Art & Design, requested a tour of the Waste Transfer Station, as well as asked the following questions: 

    1. Do any of you have a rough estimate of how many plastic water bottles the U of I population goes through in a day (week, month, year)?

    2. Would it be possible to collect a few of the plastic water bottles from the recycling center for this project?

    Weaver is working on a public engagement piece about the oceans, climate, plastics and interconnected ecosystems and needs approximately 2500-4000 bottles. The project is a whale sculpture named CETACEAN. 

    Shawn Patterson from Facilities & Services replied explaining that the waste transfer station acquires 2-3 thousand pounds of plastics each month and will be able to accommodate the professor's need for plastics.

  19. 9-19-22 Internal Meeting

    Associated Project(s): 
    "Don't Waste" with Coca-Cola

    On September 19, UIUC sustainability representatives discussed the following:

    • We need to talk with Coca-Cola about best practices from other schools regarding zero waste athletic events.

    • Jen: coordinating a phone call with Ohio State University — think about how we (UIUC) can partner with other campus units:

      • Reusable containers, change behaviors through Dining Services folks. Will invite people from the Union. Jen will invite Daphne to this conversation.

    • Daphne will be talking to a OSU about general waste practices and athletics specifically as part of the Big Ten & Friends Waste Affinity Survey being worked on.

    • Zero Waste Events:

      • Think about our ability to compost.

      • We could do this for the Nov 14 zero waste game, and we could collaborate with the Recycling Center (Scott Tess) — organic waste (food and yard debris), not any compostable goods (no cutlery).

      • In the upcoming call with the Landscape Center, we will discuss the feasibility of this.

      • In the previous zero waste game, Student for Environmental Concerns stood around the bins and said to passersby where to put recycling

        • Will want to get volunteers for our event (iSEE can help with their sustainability network).

        • SSLC would be a great resource.

    • Clerk for Zero Waste: how does Jen feel about glass recycling?

      • Shreya, Daphne could communicate how this is done

      • Glass: dining and catering services recycle

      • Glass: athletic events

        • Aaron: Spectra (vendor)

        • In order to be LEED Certified, the State Farm Center committed to recycling concessions

        • Aaron: the majority of what they buy comes in aluminum cans.

          • Specialty drinks like Kombucha may come in a glass bottle.

      • Waste audits: 8 buildings. Small amount of glass coming out of buildings that it isn’t an urgent issue. Glass going into landfill is wasteful, but not poisonous like plastic is

    • Picnic table cell phone charging stations:

      • Request by Jake to put together a timeline.

    • Recycling bins at DIA — Morgan is unclear about this:

      • 3 bins with Smith.

      • State Farm Center is in progress.

    • Sponsorship fee coming from advertisements on campus:

      • If we increase their advertisements around campus, when do we need to start considering that they owe us more for this increased advertising on campus?

      • OSU contract: much larger fund. Their athletic revenue exceeds ours by a couple hundred million a year. They have a 100,000 person stadium, we are around 60,000. Limits our advertising revenue potential.

      • Usually other schools are happy to talk contracts with other schools, unless there is a NDA.

      • No NDA for us. Usually there is some level of confidentiality. Releasing agreement information depends on legal offices at universities.

    • Aaron: interested in hearing from OSU, pursuit of refillable bottles. Riff with Coca-Cola? Ramifications of that, if we pursue at UIUC?

      • Reusable containers, glass, plastic, cardboard, continue to talk with Coke about this. Interns digging into research about the different materials. Coke has said plastic better for Earth than aluminum cans. Some sustainability advocates agree. Shantanu Pai had looked at plastic vs aluminum for UIUC campus and came up with: it’s not an easy answer. we could be looking long term, large scale. Our campus could identify the best option for people who don’t have reusable items

    • Long term, could Coca-Cola support the dump and run in the spring? Coke pays employees to help with our efforts?

      • Aaron: sounds complicated. company hiring interns with a tie to procurement could be a concern, in terms of tying into a contract. Aaron could look into this more.

      • Shreya suggests volunteers from iSEE or zero waste team. Morgan explains that it’s during finals week, and is not ideal for students.

        • Staff and faculty are usually swamped with graduation events, etc.

    • Dump and run: collaboration with Housing, iSEE.

    • Illini Union: go through Dave Guth. Ask for student contacts available on Wednesday? Illini Union Board interested in Zero Waste Events (do they have a liaison for this?)

    Next steps:

    • Proposals for athletic events (based on the contact Jake has) — what’s worked and what hasn’t for other institutions.

    • Acquiring materials for Don’t Waste campaign (digital signs).

    • Does Jake have revised drawings for the picnic table charging stations?

    • We are asking for support from Coca-Cola about our waste audit (September 30 meeting, internal, ISTC). We need a quote. Then we can go to Coca-Cola about financial support and human resources support.

    • Coca-Cola said they would do a refreshed timeline for the year about initiatives for the Don’t Waste campaign— we are interested in seeing this soon!

    • Clarification on the bin discussion. Are they replacing? Are they sending with the new colors? Is there something going on with providing bins to athletics?

     

  20. Second Nature Carbon Credit Email Exchange

    Associated Project(s): 
    Utilize Carbon Credits
    Carbon Credit Purchasing Program (C2P2) with Second Nature

    Below is an email exchange between Meredtih Moore of iSEE and Steve Muzzy of Second Nature:

    Hi Steve,

     

    Hope you are doing well! I am touching base again to see if there is an update about the status of our carbon credit sales. We look forward to hearing from you. Thanks!

    Meredith

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

    Hello Meredith,

     

    Thanks for checking in. I've been meaning to follow up with the great news that UIUC credits have been issued and sold. However the reason I have waited is because the broker sold the credits in five batches and they are still waiting on final payment for one batch. Once they have all payments in hand, Second Nature can invoice them for your portion of the revenue. As with the entire process for this round of verification, the sale of credits has for some reason taken longer than expected. We are wanting to issue one invoice for all the batches rather than do multiple invoices - this will allow us to pay UIUC in one lump sum. 

     

    I can tell you the total number of credits sold was 115,836. And pending the final batch sales per/ton you should clear a per ton amount between $6.00-$6.50.

     

    I would expect issuance of UIUCs credit sale revenue check next month.

     

    Best,

     

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

    Thank you so much for the update, Steve!!

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