Blueprint for a Green Campus (2003 Update) 

Table of Contents | Summary | Climate-Friendly Campus | Growing Without Increasing Traffic | Safe/Healthy Campus | Consumption and Disposal Habits | 2002 Blueprint Update | 2001 Blueprint Update | Original Blueprint  

Summary

In April of 2000, the University of Colorado Environmental Center released the Blueprint for a Green Campus. To quote the introduction to the Blueprint:

"Building on the environmental successes at CU over the last two decades, we propose a vision of a growing, dynamic campus which steps lightly upon the earth and satisfies additional demands for energy, transportation, and resources through increased efficiency rather than increased consumption."

The Blueprint lays out challenging goals in the areas of climate change, transportation, health and safety, and disposal and consumption habits. The 2001 Update to the Blueprint for a Green Campus was released in 2001, and the 2002 Update was released last spring as a check-in on the Blueprint. This document seeks to answer questions on support for the Blueprint goals, what progress has been made, obstacles to progress, and newly emerging issues.

The major campus departments have reported on their progress on working toward the goals set forth in the Blueprint. Information from the departments is incorporated throughout this document. The complete reports as submitted by Facilities Management, Housing, UCSU, Environmental Health and Safety, and Parking and Transit Services are available online.

The Blueprint has been formally endorsed by two major campus bodies: the University of Colorado Student Union and the Boulder Faculty Assembly. The Blueprint was also recognized by the United States Environmental Protection Agency, which issued a Year 2000 Climate Protection Award to the Environmental Center for the creation of the Blueprint.

The Chancellor's Executive Committee reviewed the Blueprint for a Green Campus in spring 2000, and set up a Blueprint Committee, chaired by the vice chancellor for administration. The committee has now been replaced by a standing Campus Environmental Council. In 2003, the Boulder Faculty Assembly also created a subcommittee on the environment.

Progress during 2002-2003

There are several initiatives worth reporting on.

Institutional and Structural Issues: The 2002 Blueprint Update described the debate surrounding the creation of a campus environmental council, and included a resolution by the Environmental Board supporting the creation of a council. In fall of 2002, the vice chancellors agreed to create such a council. In January 2003 the council began meeting. The charge and membership of the council are included as an appendix to this document and can also be viewed here.

Last year's update also discussed the move toward paid printing in campus computer labs as a step towards greening the campus marketplace. This is continuing to move forward, with implementation expected for fall semester of 2003. One new aspect is that Imaging Services has agreed to switch to the highest percentage of post-consumer recycled content paper that is compatible with the equipment. The experience to date has indicated that a 100% post-consumer content recycled paper will work. This will reinforce the environmental benefits of the switch from "free" printing to paid printing.

Another area that is in play in the realm of greening the campus marketplace is parking pricing. As part of the planning process for up to 1900 beds of new student housing at Williams Village, the city and the campus agreed to jointly sponsor a transportation and parking study. The study, conducted by Nelson/Nygaard associates, compared a number of scenarios, largely distinguished by the amount and price of parking. One of the key questions is whether the cost of parking should be subsidized by rents, or whether the costs should be born only by those who choose to have a car. If car owners bear the full cost, the rates that must be charged are high enough to significantly dampen demand. At the high end of the range, 4 parking structures housing up to 2200 cars would be built; at the low end only one parking structure would be constructed. (http://fm.colorado.edu/planning/bcpc/)

An interesting exercise was the 2003 student environmental survey. In April 2003 the UCSU Environmental Center contracted Aspen Media and Marketing to conduct a phone survey of 300 randomly chosen, full-time CU-Boulder students to gauge the current level of environmental concern at the university. Of the students surveyed, 86 percent believed that it is either very important or somewhat important that CU is a leader in campus environmental management.

Survey results indicate that students believe that the university should expand its use of renewable energy; use recycled or tree-free paper; eliminate the use of chemical pesticides on campus lawns; and offer organic food in campus dining halls.

• 92% of the student body supports a $2.00 student fee increase to fund 100% wind generated electricity for the three student controlled buildings � the UMC student union, the Recreation Center, and the Wardenburg Health Center
• 72% of residence hall students would support a $10/month rent increase in order to purchase wind energy for the residence halls
• 74% of students are opposed to spraying pesticides on campus lawns to control dandelions.
• 75% of students believe campus food service should offer organic options; 40% would be willing to pay 20 percent more for organic food.
• 63% of students strongly or somewhat supported the upcoming switch to paid printing in campus computer labs to reduce paper waste.

The survey results can be viewed online.

Some interesting developments in the individual goal areas include:

Creating a Climate-Friendly Campus: One major structural change was the creation of the campus energy officer position. This has allowed a renewed institutional focus on energy and resource conservation, as a level not seen since the late 1970s 'energy crisis." An outside force � high natural gas prices � has also created a strong financial incentive for investment in energy efficiency. The energy section of this document will describe some of the actions in this arena.

For the first time in many years, the trend of increased energy consumption per square foot of building area seems to be turning around. The combination of individual response to the generation green energy education campaign, "de-lamping" of campus buildings, and lighting upgrades appears to be having a measurable impact. For the first time in 10 years, energy and water usage declined significantly last year. Per square foot, the CU-Boulder campus used 2.2 percent less electricity during fiscal year 2002-03 compared to the previous fiscal year. For the last decade, campus energy use has risen each year by about 5 percent per year.

One side effect of the high cost of natural gas is a change to the operations of the campus cogeneration facility. In order to save money by avoiding the use of natural gas, CU-Boulder is now purchasing more power from Excel Energy, and producing less electricity. This means that our power mix is shifted in the direction of coal, rather than natural gas. Because of this the emissions inventory conducted in 2000 probably significantly undercounts our current emissions.

One major new initiative this year was the development of a biodiesel program on the Boulder campus. The lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions associated with the use of biodiesel are far lower than for use of conventional diesel fuel. CU students voted by a margin of 83% to 17% to increase student fees to provide funding for this effort. Transportation Services has teamed up with the student effort to run all of the diesel Buff Buses on biodiesel � 3 on B-100 (100% biodiesel) and 10 on B-20 (20% biodiesel, 80% conventional diesel mix). Some of this is produced from the grease from campus food services; most is purchased from Blue Sun Biodiesel. Special Transit is also now running one HOP bus on B-100, and we are in discussion on the conversion of more of the HOP fleet; RTD has committed to a pilot project, where they will fuel half of the SKIP buses with B-20; the city is fueling a number of vehicles with B-20, Boulder Biodiesel is selling B-100 to the public, and Bartkus oil has opened a public B-20 pump. CU student Andrew Azman, founder of CU biodiesel, is receiving a Brower Youth award for this effort (1, 2).

On the academic side, the CU-Boulder team won the national solar decathlon. This team of engineering and architecture students built a remarkable demonstration solar house, which is currently located on the Boulder campus.

Growing Without Increasing Traffic: In August 2002 the new STAMPEDE shuttle linking east campus and main campus began. Student ridership has reached approximately 17,000 rides/month, making it the fourth highest ridership route behind the SKIP, HOP, and B. Overall, student ridership on RTD routes went up by 14.3%, or 177,000 trips. Student transit ridership by route and year may be viewed here.

The economic slowdown has affected RTD's revenues. This has led to several significant issues, including cutbacks to bus service and a proposal to eliminate the Ecopass program. However, compromises have been reached on these issues, allowing the Boulder community transit network to continue, and preserving the Ecopass prpgram, including the faculty/staff program.

In spring of 2003 a year-long study process began, to create a transportation master plan for the campus. This will be the most comprehensive look to date at both supply and demand management options for the campus. This effort can be viewed here.

There was also significant progress this year on encouraging bicycle use. Parking and Transit Services, Housing, and the Environmental Center teamed up to jointly fund the replacement of approximately 1,000 out of date bike racks. The University of Colorado Federal Credit Union began a new loan program, the “Easy Ride," which allows CU students who are credit union members to borrow up to $500 interest free towards the purchase of a bicycle. Finally, the Environmental Center and Parking and Transit Services launched a new “Buff Bikes" free cruiser bicycle checkout program. Some information can be found here.

Creating a Safe and Healthy Campus: Facilities Management, Housing and UCSU departments are all working toward using less toxic cleaners in their custodial operations. Facilities Management has developed a toxicity ranking system for cleaners and has reviewed over 200 products to date. The cumulative efforts of all departments could naturally evolve toward a formalized program.

CU's Integrated Pest Management (IPM) program continues to prove its effectiveness in controlling unwanted pests with preventative measures and with the least toxic and most effective approaches. Chemical sprays continue to be avoided for indoor pest control. However, this year, an herbicide spray occurred outdoors in an attempt to control a significant dandelion outbreak which resulted from a moist spring following a severe drought. Controversy followed the decision to spray and discussions will continue in order to seek the least toxic and morst effective approach to controlling broadleaf weeds.

Additionally, Environmental Health and Safety continues to lead the campus toward responsible hazardous waste disposal and reduction efforts. EH&S is implementing a new chemical inventory management system to better track, control and respond to the thousands of chemicals stored and used in laboratories.

Greening Campus Consumption and Disposal Habits: The Environmental Center added a student position to advance environmentally preferable purchasing strategies for CU. The Campus Environmental Council green purchasing subcommittee will explore opportunities for contract reform and purchasing standards on an institutional scale. A Green Purchasing Expo was held in April 2003 with vendors showing a variety of products and services geared to institutional applications. An exciting specific accomplishment occurred with Facilities Management converting general fund bathrooms to 100% recycled toilet paper at equal quality and a lower cost than the previously purchased products.

One interesting development on recycling is that analysis conducted by the recycling partnership indicates that CU has been meeting the Blueprint goal of capping solid waste going to the landfill at year 2000 levels. Initial findings suggest that the combination of recycling, composting, and other waste reduction efforts appear to be containing the amount of waste that is landfilled. The chart at right shows a gradual reduction in trash dumpster volumes and a corresponding increase in the materials collected through CU Recycling.

In fall of 2002 the vice chancellors of administration and student affairs initiated a "business plan review of recycling activities". This allowed a comprehensive financial analysis of recycling on campus (which is split among multiple departmental budgets) and a comparison to the costs of solid waste disposal. The analysis has shown that the net cost for waste disposal to Facilities Management would increase by at least $174,000 if materials that are currently collected for recycling were instead landfilled. This is the first time that solid evidence has existed that recycling has a net positive fiscal impact on the campus.

2002-2003 Emerging Issues

Water: The drought which hit Colorado in 2002 has had an impact on the university. CU gets much of its irrigation water from ditch rights from the Boulder creek watershed, and purchases treated water from the City of Boulder. CU uses approximately 450 million gallons of treated water and 85 million gallons of ditch water each year. During the summer of 2002, Colorado suffered the most severe drought since the creation of the university � in fact, tree ring analysis indicates that the last time that water levels were this low in the Boulder Creek watershed was the early 1700s.

In response, the city of Boulder imposed outdoor watering restrictions, and asked for voluntary indoor water conservation efforts. In addition, the city is currently considering revisions to the rate structure designed to provide a larger financial incentive for conservation. The city currently charges an escalating price; that is, as the amount of water used increases, the cost/gallon also increases. The city is considering a proposal to make the surcharge for heavy water use larger, and to impose additional surcharges during droughts. This will increase costs to CU, and may provide additional incentives to conserve.

Already, CU has responded to the drought in several ways. First, efforts to convert fields from city water to ditch water have been accelerated, to minimize the use of expensive treated water for irrigation. The Recreation Center has also developed plans to replace a number of fields with artificial turf, which requires no watering, including Farrand Field, the Business field, and fields at Williams Village. The feasibility study can be viewed here.

CU has also taken a number of steps to reduce indoor water use. The most significant have involved changes to campus cooling systems. Most cooling in campus buildings uses chilled water. In many cases, cooling systems have used this water only once, rather than recirculating the water. As an example, the campus is replacing the cooling system for the lasers at the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics with a new closed loop system, which will save 25 million gallons per year. Per square foot, the CU-Boulder campus saved 11 percent on potable water consumption compared to the previous year.

The Fiscal Impacts of Environmental Programs: The State of Colorado and the University of Colorado are faced with an unprecedented fiscal crisis, with deep budget cuts affecting nearly every state department. In this situation, can the university afford to improve its environmental programs and attempt to implement new initiatives to reduce impact on the air, water, and land? A number of examples, from this campus and others, suggest that the question may be whether CU can afford not to improve its environmental performance. Right now, the evidence is suggestive, but is program specific and anecdotal; however, the Environmental center will conduct a more comprehensive review of the costs and savings associated with campus environmental programs during the 2003-2004 academic year.

The most comprehensive study of the link between improved environmental performance and lowered costs for campuses is a 1998 study by the National Wildlife Federation, published as a report titled Green Investment, Green Return: How Practical Conservation Projects Save Millions on America's Campuses. This report highlights many case studies of campuses "success at achieving the twin goals of doing the right thing for the environment and saving money". Some of the areas where there is the most potential for reducing costs over the long term are in the areas of transportation, reducing energy use, reducing waste, and recycling and composting. Let's look at each area in turn.

Transportation: The conventional approach to transportation at many schools has been pretty simple: wait until complaints about parking reach a crescendo, then build some new parking lots and wait a few years until the demand and complaints start to grow, then do it all over again. This may be why the former chancellor of the University of California at Berkeley stated that "A university is a diverse community held together by common complaints about parking"!

However, there is a big financial problem with this approach. Many schools, including CU, do not have additional land that can be devoted to surface parking lots. In fact, new construction often uses up land which used to be devoted to surface parking. The supply of surface parking decreases as institutions convert parking lots into other uses, such as new research buildings, dormitories, stadiums, and theaters, while the new uses increase parking demand. The campus is then faced with either acquiring new land � a very expensive proposition and often impossible � or constructing parking structures over existing surface lots. The capital cost of construction is quite high �in the range of $15,000 to $30,000 per net new parking space Thus for 1,000 spaces a campus would be looking at $15 million - $30 million in capital costs. Recovering this from users could require monthly parking fees of $100 or more � much higher than is typically charged or is politically acceptable to the campus community.

Are there are other approaches to managing transportation demand that are less expensive? In most cases where land constraints lead to the use of structured parking, the answer is yes. And these approaches are better for the environment.

Cornell University provides a great example. In the early 1990s Cornell faced demand for building thousands of new parking spaces. Instead, they decided to create a new transportation demand management program, which emphasized expanded transit, increased parking rates, and strong financial incentives for carpooling. The results were dramatic. Over a 6-year period, the campus built only 350 new parking spaces, instead of the 3100 spaces that would have otherwise been required. After subtracting out the cost of the program, the total savings over these six years approach $13 million dollars. And, the program led to a 25% decline in the number of vehicles driven by faculty and staff to campus.

Here at CU, the faculty/staff bus pass program has also been a good investment for the campus. This program allows each permanent faculty or staff member who is eligible for benefits to ride local and regional buses and light rail by showing his or her university ID. Because some employees have reduced the number of times they drive to campus, or stopped driving to campus, due to the availability of free transit, some parking spaces are freed up - a total of 350 spaces based on an analysis by Parking and Transit Services. The annual cost of the bus pass program comes to $1,125 per parking space left open. For comparison, the annual debt service required to provide one additional parking space by building a new parking structure on an existing surface lot would be more than $2,700. Thus, it is 2.5 times as expensive to provide one additional parking space compared to reducing demand by one space. The net annual savings to campus, compared to providing 350 new spaces, is $560,000.

An analysis in the existing conditions report for the Transportation Master Plan produced the table above.

Energy: The bottom line: campus energy use is not cheap. Here at CU, the trend over the last decade has been one of dramatically escalating energy use, with annual increases in electricity consumption hovering around 5%. The actual costs went up even faster. In the 2000-2001 fiscal year, for example, electricity costs rose by 9.9%! Annual utilities costs exceed $6 million. And the campus may need to invest tens of millions of dollars in new power capacity to serve campus growth. Are there opportunities to reduce some of these costs?

Perhaps the best example is the State University of New York. Maybe their hard winters explain it, but SUNY Buffalo (UB) has made energy conservation an integral part of campus operation for twenty years now. One comprehensive energy retrofit project alone led to a $3 million dollar annual saving in energy cost. They estimate that over a 15-year period, the cumulative energy cost savings were over $60 million dollars. According to Walter Simpson, then energy officer at UB, " Conservation and efficiency mean less strip mines, oil fields, smog, acid rain, and global warming. Moreover, conservation projects can be set up so that they pay for themselves. Campuses would be crazy not to do these projects just from a financial point of view."

Here at CU, the same approach is beginning. In response to the big cost increases, the administration has created a new energy officer position, partially modeled after UB, and has ramped up funding for efforts to reduce energy use on campus. These range from educational campaigns designed to get students and employees to turn off lights and computers when not in use, to major capital investments in energy efficiency. The potential savings are huge. According to an analysis by the energy officer, just getting campus computer users to enable the energy saving sleep mode on their computer monitors could save the campus up to $450,000/year, while also reducing annual emissions of greenhouse gases by 3500 tons of carbon dioxide.

Reducing Waste: Another area where there is ample room to lower costs while reducing our environmental footprint is through reform of our purchasing practices and materials use. One example is the move towards pay for printing in campus computer labs. The Library estimated that paper use in these labs increased by 28% and toner cartridge use increased by 35% in just one year in 2001. Housing experienced similar increases prior to adopting a pay-for-print system in February 2001." Housing eliminated free printing from computer labs in the residence halls, instead charging individual users. In the first year of implementation Housing estimated a 55% reduction in paper use. Currently, ITS computer labs print approximately 30,000 reams of paper annually. At a conservative estimate of 33% savings, a conversion to pay for printing could save 10,000 reams per year. If the reduction is as large as that within housing, the reduction could be over 15,000 reams per year - all at a net savings to the university.

This is an illustration of how CU can harness the power of the free market. By having individual users pay for their use of resources that have a high environmental impact � whether it is driving a car to a parking space or printing a paper � instead of socializing the cost across the university, resource use goes down while economic efficiency goes up.

There are other arenas where costs can be saved and waste reduced through smart purchasing. Some campus departments are saving money by using recycled content paper towels and toilet paper. Other departments have found that it is cheaper for them to purchase furniture made from recycled wheat straw than it is to furniture made from virgin wood. At the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the school saves a quarter-million dollars a year by selling and reusing materials that the university used to throw away. The undergraduate chemistry labs at the University of Minnesota switched to "microscale" lab techniques, which demonstrate chemical principles with much smaller volumes of chemical. The net effect � hazardous waste generated annually went down from 2500 gallons to 23 gallons, for a cost savings of $37,000/year.

There may be many untapped opportunities on this campus to reduce waste and buy greener products, at no net cost to the campus. This could be advanced by adopting an environmentally friendly purchasing policy, requiring that environmentally preferable products be purchased if they are no more expensive than the standard products they substitute for, and by inserting environmental language into the bidding process.

Recycling and Composting: Colorado has some of the lowest landfill rates in the country � so they have no direction to go but up. From 1996 to 2001 the landfill rates CU has to pay went up by 83%. Despite campus growth during this time, the amount of waste that Facilities Management delivered to the landfill remained flat � there was even a slight decline from 3300 tons in 1996-97 to 3100 tons in 2001-2002. Without the CU Recycling program, CU would have to haul another 1400 tons of waste to the landfill every year � at substantial cost. Not only would the campus be paying to dispose of these materials, instead of getting paid for them, but the materials would have to be hauled much further away (the nearest landfill is in Weld County), with the associated trucking costs. So, while recycling costs money � there's no free lunch! � it also reduces the campus's cost for landfill disposal.

The business plan review of recycling conducted for the vice chancellor's of administration and student affairs in 2002-2003 has provided a comprehensive analysis of the financial impacts of campus recycling activities. There are a number of highlights from the report. It points out that over 1,400 tons will be recycled at CU Boulder this year, which accounts for approximately 30% of the waste generated on campus.

This analysis indicates that recycling is saving Facilities Management a net of $175,000 per year in solid waste costs. For general fund waste, trash disposal costs Facilities Management $601/ton; recycling costs them $286/ton. In the aggregate, every ton recycled in the general fund buildings saves the general fund $315. Each dollar spent on recycling saves $2.10 in trash. The reasons that recycling is so much cheaper are interesting. The primary reason is not the tipping fee charged at the landfill (landfill fees are only $20/ton!), but reflect the fact that the system that has developed on campus for collection and transport of recyclables materials is much lower cost than the collection and transport of solid waste.

It is also striking that some campuses have achieved recycling + composting rates of 50-60%. If CU is able to achieve these rates, the financial benefit to the campus will grow. The next major improvement is food waste composting from residence halls and the UMC � which could divert 600+ tons/year. Now, the savings from, composting will not approach the $315/ton savings that recycling generates for general fund materials, but nonetheless there should be net savings. Right now all of the food waste on campus is thrown away, and trucked to the landfill. Meanwhile, we also buy fertilizer and soil amendments for campus landscaping. A composting program has the potential to save money on both ends � reducing disposal costs and saving money spent on purchasing soil amendments. For example, the housing department estimates that using finished compost instead of purchasing fertilizer could save $10,000 annually.