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  1. May TED Talk: Eco-Edition Series - Bikes!

    Associated Project(s): 
    TED Talk: Eco Edition Series

    The May TED Talk: Eco-Edition event will be held on 5/31 from 6-7 PM. It is hosted by our very own Tyler Swanson, an incoming senior and the clerk for the Energy and Transportation iCAP Teams.

    Tyler will present a pre-recorded TED Talk by Adam Stones, “How Cycling Can Transform Places” followed by a guided discussion. The semester may be over, but this is a great opportunity to connect with each other in a casual, no-pressure setting. Sign up here to receive the Zoom link: https://illinois.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0rc-upqzkoG91isKwq2w-20GAxOU_qS4HM

    Feel free to pass this along to anyone who may be interested!

  2. Illini Union Events, Reusable Water Bottles

    Associated Project(s): 
    Zero Waste Messaging Campaign
    Reduce Single-Use Plastics

    In the Illini Union event marketing, they provide information about water bottle refilling stations that are near the event. This is apart of their messaging campaign to reduce single use plastic in campus events. Illini Union does not have a policy against providing single use water bottles, but encourages event attendees to bring their own reusable water bottles.

  5. ArcGIS Field Maps application to be used for tagging abandoned bicycles

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

    Sarthak Prasad worked with Chad Kupferschmid, from F&S FIR, to develop an electric way to tag bicycles on campus and mark them on a GIS based map. Chad developed the Field Maps application for this project. We would use it in three phases:

    Phase 1: Initial tagging of the bicycles - Only Tag ID and Comments section available

    Phase 2: Confirming the abandoned bicycles - New field (Abandoned or not) would be available

    Phase 3: Inventory of the impounded bicycles - Once confirmed, the Parking department would remove the bicycle and transport them to the Round Barns, where Sarthak Prasad along with his intern will inventory all the impounded bicycles. During this phase, more fields - Make/model information, Bike Registration information, Serial Number information, pictures, etc. would be available

    This app was ready for us to use by the end of May

  7. Sarthak met with Gabe Lewis to talk about Electric Vehicles and EV charging

    Associated Project(s): 
    Increase use of EVs and other Alternative Service Vehicles
    Use Electric Vehicles (EV)
    Install Public Use Electric Vehicle (EV) Charging Stations

    On May 24, Sarthak Prasad met with Gabe Lewis to talk about EVs. Gabe is the Transportation Planner at the Champaign County Regional Planning Commission (CCRPC) and he currently leads the RPC Tech Committee which consists of 7 members – Champaign, Urbana, Savoy, Rantoul, St. Joseph, Mahomet, and Champaign County. Most recently, they had been talking about the feasibility of EVs in urban as well as the rural areas in the county.

    We talked about the US DOT's Charging Forward, an EV toolkit, that is primarily focused on EV Charging in the rural areas: https://www.transportation.gov/rural/ev/toolkit

    We also talked about Clean City Coalition. State of Illinois does not have a coalition, but Chicago has one and we could potentially reach out to them: https://cleancities.energy.gov/coalitions/

    https://cleancities.energy.gov/coalitions/chicago

    Also discussed the federal funding available through National EV Infrastructure (NEVI), Carbon Reduction Program (CRP), State and Local Planning for Energy (https://maps.nrel.gov/slope/), and EV Pro Lite (https://afdc.energy.gov/evi-pro-lite)

  9. Lighting Retrofits are important - article in Popular Science

    Associated Project(s): 
    Lighting Conservation Projects
    Provide Centralized Communication about Sustainability
    Centralized Energy Efficiency Efforts

    “Incandescent bulbs use more energy and produce more heat due to their engineering designs,” says Paul Foote, energy efficiency and conservation specialist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. It’s important to shift to more energy-efficient alternatives to reduce the environmental impacts of incandescent bulbs from the utilization of fossil fuels for electricity, he added.

    By mandating a minimum light output or lumens per watt, manufacturers make sure all bulbs can effectively light up a room, which ensures that consumers will avoid overusing energy with substandard bulbs to get the same level of brightness, says Foote. “When upgrading from incandescent bulbs to LEDs, we have noticed a 60 percent decrease in energy consumption on average, and therefore energy cost avoidance has reduced our utility bill by similar amounts for lighting,” he adds.

    <--break->Popular Science interviewed Paul Foote at F&S as part of their article about the importance of lighting retrofits. the full article is available online at https://www.popsci.com/environment/light-bulbs-sustainability-energy/. 

     

     

     

  15. Suggestion for Reducing Plastic Waste

    Associated Project(s): 
    Sustainability Council

    From: Fraterrigo, Jennifer M <jmf at illinois.edu>
    Sent: Thursday, May 19, 2022 5:27 PM
    To: Brown Young, Danita M <dbyoung at illinois.edu>
    Cc: Moore, Meredith Kaye <mkm0078 at illinois.edu>; White, Morgan <mbwhite at illinois.edu>
    Subject: swag for new students

     

    Dear Vice Chancellor Young,

     

    I am writing to follow up about reducing plastic waste and how we might accomplish that through the swag new students receive when they arrive on campus. At the Sustainability Council meeting last week, you mentioned that students are given water bottles, reusable straws and utensils, which is great! We wanted to explore with you the possibility of giving students a coupon that could be redeemed for a water bottle of their choosing instead of giving them a standard water bottle. The reason is that we think students might value a bottle more if they select it rather than if they are given a standard bottle.

     

    Thanks for considering it and looking forward to hearing from you.

     

    Sincerely,

    Jennifer

    ____

     

    Jennifer Fraterrigo (she/her)

    iSEE Associate Director for Campus Sustainability and
    Professor of Landscape and Ecosystem Ecology
    Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences

    University of Illinois

    W-423 Turner Hall, 1102 S. Goodwin Ave.

    Urbana, IL 61801

    jmf at illinois.edu
    ph 217-333-9428

    https://fraterrigolab.nres.illinois.edu/

  16. Low-Carbon Concrete Information

    Associated Project(s): 
    Green Infrastructure

    The production of concrete is responsible for 8% of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. The articles below detail research about a low carbon concrete formula which reduces the carbon footprint by 40%. UIUC Professors, including Professor Lav Varshney and Professor Nishant Garg, have been involved in the development of this technology.

    https://www.npr.org/2022/05/18/1099680622/can-a-new-concrete-mixture-hel...

    https://theconstructionbroadsheet.com/meta-sees-success-with-lowcarbon-c...

    https://csl.illinois.edu/news/46838

     

  17. Sustainability Council Meeting 5-12-22

    Associated Project(s): 
    Sustainability Council

    The Sustainability Council met on 5-12-22 and discussed the following agenda. The meeting slides and minutes are attached.

    Agenda:

    •Introductions

    •Sustainable Land Management Plan

    •Waste Reduction Strategies

    •Updates

    • Campus Landscape Master Plan
    • Sustainability in Gen Ed requirements
    • STARS Shifting to Platinum
    • Student Groups

    •Old business

    Attached Files: 

  19. meeting with F&S and iSEE about Zero Waste programs

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

    iSEE and F&S met to discuss commodity recyclables at F&S and the interest in looking at getting Coke to buy our PET, the Zero Waste messaging campaign and potential collaboration with Coke on the messaging for our Use the Bin campaign.  Also, Coke offers a tailgate package that may be helpful in our conversations about increasing recycling at athletic events.

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