From: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>

Sent: Wednesday, May 3, 2023 7:37 AM
To: B10andFriends@umich.edu
Subject: Waste Affinity Survey & Meeting

Morning Big 10 and Friends,

 

Hope everyone everyone’s semester is wrapping up nicely. A big thank you goes out to everyone who participated in the Waste Survey [redacted] so far. We’ve already found the excel tool has been helpful in considering new initiatives. If you haven't had the chance to add your school's information, please do so at your earliest convenience.

If you’re interested in reviewing the waste results together, fill out this When2Meet [redacted] by Wednesday, May 10th.

 

Looking forward to catching up and discussing the findings with all of you!

 

Mary, Tony, and the survey subgroup

 

Mary Leciejewski, MS
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: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, May 3, 2023 6:52 AM
To: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>; Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi Dominika,

 

Thanks for the nudge. I just had an email exchange with Tony, and we've decided to send out an email to find a time to review results, as well as to encourage everyone who hasn’t yet to complete the survey. We'll have to work with the responses we get, and I know our group has already found the results useful. This is a good litmus test for gauging people's availability for benchmarking surveys in the future.

 

Hope everyone is making it through the tsunami that is move-out! I am continually shocked at the amount of material going to waste this time of year.

 

Mary Leciejewski, MS

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: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Sent: Friday, April 28, 2023 1:09 PM
To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>; Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu
Subject: Re: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hello all,

 

Just to briefly reintroduce myself, I am an intern working with Daphne on this waste management survey. I'd like to thank you all for the contributions that you have made for this initiative; it has been very exciting witnessing the collaboration and ideas that have been taking place. Given that we have some responses, do you believe that we have enough information to move forward to the analysis phase of the project? As of today, we are still awaiting responses from nine universities for the general questions and fourteen universities for their diversion rate methodologies.

 

Thank you,

DOMINIKA P. SZAL (she/her)

Waste Management Intern

(217) 333-9191 | dszal2@illinois.edu

Facilities & Services | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

 

Please consider the environment before printing out an email. Under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act any written communication to or from university employees regarding university business is a public record and may be subject to public disclosure.

From: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2023 06:09
To: Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>; Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu <alisonlr@umich.edu>; nberg@umich.edu <nberg@umich.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Thanks everyone for your feedback. I will get the survey out later today! 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: Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, January 25, 2023 1:44 PM
To: Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi, all. I added a few clarifying comments to the Diversion Rate Methodology sheet. The comments are on cells: Precious Metals, Yard Waste, Recycled Batteries, Recycled Vehicles, and Surplus Donate Items. I also added a few more streams we

Hi, all.

 

I added a few clarifying comments to the Diversion Rate Methodology sheet. The comments are on cells: Precious Metals, Yard Waste, Recycled Batteries, Recycled Vehicles, and Surplus Donate Items.

I also added a few more streams we track that were not on the list. Those cells are filled with yellow. Feel free to remove if they don’t make sense. For the added Surplus Sold Items stream, it will be dependent on the answer to the comment on Surplus Donated Items.

 

Thank you!

 

Patrick T. Brown | He/Him
Sustainability Coordinator | Campus Planning, Architecture and Sustainability

 

m: 219-677-6330

Website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram

 

 

From: Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, January 25, 2023 9:38 AM
To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Thanks Daphne.  Mary actually made that draft (thank you Mary!) and Patrick and I had a few minor edits to add.  Hopefully that can be completed today or tomorrow and back to you for review.  We will definitely include the idea of the “other – list please” being added.

 

Thanks again,

Tony

 

From: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2023 8:10 PM
To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

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

 

Thanks for the feedback, Daphne.

 

Once we have the go-ahead from Tony, I will send to the larger affinity group.

 

Excited to see all the results!

 

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, January 24, 2023 4:33 PM
To: Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi Tony, I took a look at the new tab for diversion materials and think it looks great. There was a comment made asking about what to do if a school has a material they include in the rate that isn’t listed on the sheet, so I added a “Other

 

Hi Tony,

 

I took a look at the new tab for diversion materials and think it looks great. There was a comment made asking about what to do if a school has a material they include in the rate that isn’t listed on the sheet, so I added a “Other – please list” column for that purpose.

 

Otherwise, I am happy with the survey and would call it good! Thanks so much for the assistance.

 

Thank you,

 

Daphne

 

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


Please consider the environment before printing an email. Under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act any written communication to or from university employees regarding university business is a public record and may be subject to public disclosure.

 

 

 

From: Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2023 8:05 AM
To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Thanks Daphne.  We will get back to you ASAP!

 

From: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>
Sent: Friday, January 13, 2023 10:19 AM
To: Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

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

 

Hi Tony,

 

Thanks for the update! We are appreciative of the feedback you and OSU have provided and are happy to incorporate it. I think the suggestion to add a tab for diversion rate materials is a great one, and we would appreciate your help with integrating it into the survey!

 

Thank you,

Daphne

 

From: Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>
Sent: Thursday, January 12, 2023 12:55 PM
To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi Daphne,  Mary and I met to discuss the Waste Affinity Group topics and we are hoping to be able to focus in on the survey you have developed.  Once the document is ready to share, we are happy to help send it to the group, and then we can remind folks to complete it at the February BTAF Meeting (exact date TBD).  We are anticipating not having a Waste Affinity Meeting prior to the full BTAF Meeting in February, but if this group needs to get together, just let me know and I would be happy to schedule. 

 

In terms of finishing the survey, it appears that you have largely incorporated all the recommendations, thank you!  There is one modification that I wanted to validate with you that our group has offered to make:  a separate tab in the same spreadsheet where the answers for cell AH Materials included in your diversion rate can be put into its own grid and easier to compare school to school.  If you are good with this idea, we will try to complete this next week and send it back. 

 

Thank you,

Tony

 

From: Anthony Gillund
Sent: Friday, January 6, 2023 12:42 PM
To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi Daphne, we just had a meeting today with our local waste district and one of the questions that came up is if there are institutions that have found methods to eliminate the plastic bags from the recycling stream.  I thought some institutions do this (e.g. breaking bags of recycling into the recycling dumpster but tossing the bag into the trash).  If you think it is beneficial, perhaps this is another item to add to the survey.

 

Thanks again,

Tony

 

From: Anthony Gillund
Sent: Friday, January 6, 2023 8:51 AM
To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi Daphne, great survey and I agree with Mary it is very comprehensive!  Patrick and I reviewed the document we came up with a few recommendations for your consideration:

1. It might be beneficial to add another question after cell G3 that asks if there are secondary waste goals.
2. Cell K3 was a little confusing trying to determine what was meant by ‘Benchmark Year’…. Is this supposed to say ‘Baseline Year’ instead? 
3. For Cell AG3, we are recommending that a separate tab in the same spreadsheet where the answers can be put into its own grid and easier to compare school to school.  For instance, I found it very interesting to see UIUC include tires but not surplus material, and it would be interesting to see how many folks include tire recycling/repurposing.  Patrick is going to take a 1st stab at creating this for your review.  
4. In the Waste Metric Tracking section, would it be possible to add a few questions around accounting for avoided waste?  Take-back programs would be a prime example of this… for instance, if a university handles furniture whether by diverting it or landfilling it, but then works with a manufacturer on a take-back program, do you get to count that material as diverted?  I am not sure of the best way to ask this question(s)… maybe it should be integrated with the matrix developed as part of bullet #2? 
5. The organics section might benefit by clarification on what should be included.  We interpreted it as more than just food scraps and included animal bedding and landscape debris in our answer, but questioned if other items should be included here such as food grease recycling.

 

Thank you again for putting this together.  Looking forward to seeing it once it is all filled out!

Thanks,

 

Tony Gillund 

 

Director of Sustainability

Campus Planning, Architecture, and Sustainability

 

o: 765-494-3911 | agillund@purdue.edu

 

 

 

From: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, January 4, 2023 8:26 AM
To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

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

 

Daphne,

 

Thanks for reopening the conversation and putting this together. This survey looks comprehensive. We’re excited for the results!

 

Here’s our quick feedback:

• For “Waste Reduction Goal” section, add question asking if school has formal, published waste plan and request link.
• For D5, we usually count interns as a 3:1 FTEs. Might be useful to make this clear or to have a separate column for number of FTE’s vs. number of interns.
• For the Surplus category, I’d be interested to learn if other schools have internal reuse or external donation programs to nonprofits. (Our Surplus group has mentioned some legal/logistical issues with donation…)

 

We can make these edits directly in the survey but didn’t want to make changes without giving you a heads up/getting sign off from the group.

 

Once the other folks on the chain provide feedback, we can help disseminate to the larger BTAF group. When the results are in, it’d be a perfect intern project to assemble results in a slide show and do some data visualization. Happy to donate our intern time towards that task.

 

Best, 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, January 3, 2023 5:07 PM
To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; agillund@purdue.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi all, Happy New Year - I hope you enjoyed a nice holiday break! Dominika and I wanted to re-open the conversation on the BTAF waste survey. The questions are ready for your review/input when you have a chance J Mary & Tony, we are happy

 

Hi all,

 

Happy New Year - I hope you enjoyed a nice holiday break! Dominika and I wanted to re-open the conversation on the BTAF waste survey [redacted]. The questions are ready for your review/input when you have a chance J

 

Mary & Tony, we are happy to coordinate with you both on getting this spreadsheet out to the schools when everything is finalized.

 

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
 


Please consider the environment before printing an email. Under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act any written communication to or from university employees regarding university business is a public record and may be subject to public disclosure.

 

 

 

From: Hulse, Daphne Lauren
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2022 9:43 AM
To: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; agillund@purdue.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Thank you, Mary! We’ve got all our original survey questions inputted now and are working to finalize questions on other topics such as sustainable procurement and organic waste, which we didn’t previously include.

 

If you all have an opportunity to take a look and provide feedback, that would be appreciated!

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
 


Please consider the environment before printing an email. Under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act any written communication to or from university employees regarding university business is a public record and may be subject to public disclosure.

 

 

 

From: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2022 8:12 AM
To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; agillund@purdue.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

Hi everyone,

 

Hope everyone had a nice holiday.

 

Just want to give a shout out to Daphne and her team for uploading the survey onto the google drive in a spreadsheet format. The benchmarking tool is looking pretty robust. If you haven’t had a chance to check out the google drive, here’s the link [redacted].

 

Aside from adding additional relevant survey fields and filling in our school’s data, is there anything else we need to do to provide feedback before we take this to the larger BTAF group?

 

Thanks, 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

 

 

 

-----Original Appointment-----
From: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, October 26, 2022 3:15 PM
To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren; alisonlr@umich.edu; Leciejewski, Mary; agillund@purdue.edu; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja
Subject: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey
When: Friday, November 11, 2022 11:00 AM-12:00 PM (UTC-06:00) Central Time (US & Canada).
Where: https://illinois.zoom.us/j/83465397844?pwd=K0dHcWlkaXExOTQyUDdrN3J6VXhVUT09

 

Daphne Hulse (she/her) is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting. Join Zoom Meeting https: //illinois. zoom. us/j/83465397844?pwd=K0dHcWlkaXExOTQyUDdrN3J6VXhVUT09 Meeting ID: 834 6539 7844 Password: 337564 ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍ ‍

 

Daphne Hulse (she/her) is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Join Zoom Meeting
 

EPA Webinar Report by UIUC Facilities & Services Waste Management Intern, Shreya Mahajan. 

Link to the recording

Greetings, Colleagues,

 

I hope the start of 2023 is going well. I’m reaching out today to send you iSEE Quarterly update for Winter 2022 from the Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment.

 

For more up-to-date news from iSEE, please sign up for our E-newsletter at https://illinois.edu/fb/sec/5031776.

 

IN RESEARCH

• iSEE received a $1M gift from a class-action lawsuit settlement; it is being used for  iSEE-funded $300k low-carbon transportation solutions research.
• A new cover crop project called iCOVER received a $5M grant from USDA and was featured in The News-Gazette.
• From the Agroecosystem Sustainability Center and SMARTFARM project: 
  
  • ASC team members co-authored paper led by Stanford on cover crops’ effect on yields; also, papers on soil carbon budgets and increased adoption of cover crops
  • ASC was featured in a video for American Geophysical Union meeting, and team members also were part of an Illinois Farm Bureau video.

• From the Illinois Regenerative Agriculture Initiative: 
  
  • The Riggs Brewery “Field to Beer” video was immensely popular, receiving more than 11,000 interactions on Twitter.
  • IRAI was also featured in Illinois Farmer Today.

• From the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation:
  
  • CABBI authored a multi-institutional study that explored the first known use of CRISPR/Cas9 editing of miscanthus. Another team published a paper on 3-D phenotyping tools for miscanthus.
  • Articles have featured new Sustainability Theme Leader Wendy Yang, new Feedstock Production partner and PI Ernst Cebert of Alabama A&M, and new Conversion PI Heng Ji.
  • Six CABBI researchers (including Lisa Ainsworth, Kaiyu Guan, and Don Ort) were named to Clarivate’s highly cited list; and CABBI researchers have earned two EMSL awards for continued studies of sorghum stems.

• From the I-FARM “Farm of the Future” project:
  
  • View a new overview video.
  • Check out the FAQ article.
  • The project has received FarmWeekNow and WAND-TV coverage — and was featured on the Big Ten Network during Illini basketball games!
  • Robotics in the field media coverage in The News-Gazette.

• From the Energy-Enhancing FEWS project:
  
  • Team members are part of new $2.5M USDA grant to convert biowaste to pavement.

• Members of the Illinois Geothermal Coalition have successfully demonstrated efficient use of an abandoned oil well in the Illinois Basin as a geothermal “battery.”
• An iSEE biobased chemicals and inks project was featured for its work on printable electronics.
• Former iSEE Associate Director Gillen D’Arcy Wood recently published a new website on ocean data from 19th century voyage.

 

 IN EDUCATION & OUTREACH

• Registration is open for iSEE Congress 2023 — “Addressing Crises of a Planetary Scale: Lessons from Pandemics and Climate Change.”
• The Fall 2023 Critical Conversation is expected to bring together stakeholders to discuss climate-smart commodities.
• iSEE’s Environmental Leadership Program for Spring 2023 is already more than past the midway point; check out our student blog for some perspective on the immersive learning experience.
• Read a Certificate in Environmental Writing (CEW) success story in former Q author and CEW recipient Zack Fishman.

 

IN CAMPUS SUSTAINABILITY

• Our Grind2Energy video explored how dining hall food waste produces energy and fertilizer; its release spurred coverage by The News-Gazette and WCIA-TV.
• iSEE’s new, more comprehensive Student Action webpage offers listings for iSEE jobs, volunteering, and student organizations to join.
• Illini Lights Out fall semester featured RECORD totals: more than 640 volunteers turned off 20,303 bulbs, saving the campus as much as 35,000 kWH, $3,090, and nearly 25 tons of GHG. Spring dates: Jan. 27 (130+ volunteers, 5,043 bulbs, 8,700 kWH, $760, 6.2 tons of GHG), Feb. 10 and 24, March 24, and April 21.
• At the November Zero Waste basketball game (see video) more than 280 pounds of beverage containers and other recyclables were diverted from the landfill. The next Zero Waste basketball game March 2 seeks 100 volunteers. iSEE partnering with F&S, Housing, Athletics, and Union for a #don’twasteWednesdays twitter campaign all spring. FALL PLAN: a ZW football tailgate.
• A new Waste Transfer Station video shows the great work by Facilities & Services — but also the need for all campus community members to pre-sort their recyclables to prevent them from becoming landfill waste.
• Greener Campus certifications in the new year: One new office (Visit Champaign County!), one new chapter (Sigma Lambda Gamma sorority), and nine new events (including Illini Lights Out) certified in January.
• Read our article about the sustainable features of Campus Recreation and our feature about the new beekeeping club on campus.

 

Thanks for reading, and best wishes for the remainder of the spring semester!

 

Best,

Madhu Khanna

 

 

Madhu Khanna

Pronouns: she, her

Alvin H. Baum Family Chair & Director, Institute for Sustainability, Energy and Environment

ACES Distinguished Professor in Environmental Economics

Co-Director, Center for Economics of Sustainability

University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

1301, W. Gregory Drive, Urbana, IL 61801

 

 

 

Hi Daphne, great survey and I agree with Mary it is very comprehensive!  Patrick and I reviewed the document we came up with a few recommendations for your consideration:

It might be beneficial to add another question after cell G3 that asks if there are secondary waste goals.

Cell K3 was a little confusing trying to determine what was meant by ‘Benchmark Year’…. Is this supposed to say ‘Baseline Year’ instead? 

For Cell AG3, we are recommending that a separate tab in the same spreadsheet where the answers can be put into its own grid and easier to compare school to school.  For instance, I found it very interesting to see UIUC include tires but not surplus material, and it would be interesting to see how many folks include tire recycling/repurposing.  Patrick is going to take a 1st stab at creating this for your review.  

In the Waste Metric Tracking section, would it be possible to add a few questions around accounting for avoided waste?  Take-back programs would be a prime example of this… for instance, if a university handles furniture whether by diverting it or landfilling it, but then works with a manufacturer on a take-back program, do you get to count that material as diverted?  I am not sure of the best way to ask this question(s)… maybe it should be integrated with the matrix developed as part of bullet #2? 

The organics section might benefit by clarification on what should be included.  We interpreted it as more than just food scraps and included animal bedding and landscape debris in our answer, but questioned if other items should be included here such as food grease recycling.

 

Thank you again for putting this together.  Looking forward to seeing it once it is all filled out!

Thanks,

 

Tony Gillund 

 

Director of Sustainability

Campus Planning, Architecture, and Sustainability

 

o: 765-494-3911 | agillund@purdue.edu

 

 

From: Leciejewski, Mary <leciejewski.8@osu.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, January 4, 2023 8:26 AM
To: Hulse, Daphne Lauren <dlhulse2@illinois.edu>; alisonlr@umich.edu; Anthony Gillund <agillund@purdue.edu>; nberg@umich.edu; Patrick T Brown <brown471@purdue.edu>
Cc: Szal, Dominika Patrycja <dszal2@illinois.edu>
Subject: RE: Purdue/OSU/Michigan/UIUC Waste Survey

 

 

 

Daphne,

 

Thanks for reopening the conversation and putting this together. This survey looks comprehensive. We’re excited for the results!

 

Here’s our quick feedback:

For “Waste Reduction Goal” section, add question asking if school has formal, published waste plan and request link.

For D5, we usually count interns as a 3:1 FTEs. Might be useful to make this clear or to have a separate column for number of FTE’s vs. number of interns.

For the Surplus category, I’d be interested to learn if other schools have internal reuse or external donation programs to nonprofits. (Our Surplus group has mentioned some legal/logistical issues with donation…)

 

We can make these edits directly in the survey but didn’t want to make changes without giving you a heads up/getting sign off from the group.

 

Once the other folks on the chain provide feedback, we can help disseminate to the larger BTAF group. When the results are in, it’d be a perfect intern project to assemble results in a slide show and do some data visualization. Happy to donate our intern time towards that task.

 

Best, Mary

 

Mary Leciejewski
Zero Waste Manager

Pronouns: She/Her/Hers 

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