Discover(ing) Sustainability

Right before Mother Nature made half of New Hampshire and large chunks of Maine, Vermont and Massachusetts power down everything (UNH ice storm update here), UNH celebrated the winners of this year’s Student Energy Waste Watch Challenge: Gibbs Hall, Eaton House, and Woodside Apartment. Congratulations students!

We also announced the savings from our annual Thanksgiving power down campaign to encourage everyone to turn off and unplug computers, printers, fax machines, copiers, TV’s, and other electronics while away from the office and residence hall room.

Read more about both here.

All told, we saved approximately 192,000 kilowatt-hours (kwh) of energy, $27,000 in energy costs, and 80 metric ton equivalents of carbon dioxide emissions. That’s the equivalent of 186 barrels of oil or not driving 15 passenger cars for one year — great savings from simple actions like powering down, turning off lights, air drying clothes, conserving water, and more.

I’ve heard from countless UNH administrators, faculty and staff — and from Seacoast-area community members, businesses and others outside UNH — how inspired they are by the actions of our students. Gregg Hall faculty and and staff were so motivated that they started their own building “green team” and blog!

But what are the rest of us at UNH doing to follow the lead of the students?

I know several other offices, departments and buildings that took us up on our offer of a free “green your office” workshop last spring and summer.  And I know many individuals who have signed up to take the NH Carbon Challenge at home. But compared to what the UNH students do every year, we’re doing very little.

And consider this: the students do so much more than just the Challenge!  They also fill our Wildcat Transit buses, use GoLoco ridesharing, get involved in student organizations like the Student Organic Garden Club, take classes for the new Dual Major in EcoGastronomy, participate in RecycleMania, and more.

So how about it my fellow UNH employees:  are you up to the challenge of, well, taking the Challenge — both an employee version of the Student Energy Waste Watch Challenge at work and then then the NH Carbon Challenge at home?

Email us if you are.

New research from UNH’s Climate Change Research Center’s Cameron Wake and his former graduate student Elizabeth Burakowski confirms what anyone enjoying today’s balmy temperatures might suspect: In the northeast, winters are indeed getting warmer. The duo conducted the most rigorous analysis to date of wintertime climate data in the northeastern U.S. from 1965 to 2005 and published their work recently in the Journal of Geophysical Research - Atmospheres.

“Winter is warming faster than any other season and what we’re seeing over time is an intensification of this warming trend,” says Burakowski.  The study found that regional temperatures over those four decades are rising at a rate of .42 to .46 degrees Celsius per decade and that the number of snow-covered days is slipping awayat a rate of almost nine days per decade.

And any naysayers who point to last winter’s record snowfall as contradictory should pull their heads out of the snowbank:  Wake notes that a climatological trend toward warmer winters doesn’t mean cold winters are gone for good. “It means that the odds of a warm winter are greater now than they were four decades ago,” he says.

Meanwhile, over at the New York Times’s excellent DotEarth blog, reporter Andrew Revkin discusses a disturbing cooling trend on media interest in climate stories. He reports on an Oxford University researcher’s findings that media coverage of climate issues seems to be stagnating or decreasing. For a far more nuanced look at the issue, visit DotEarth.

Cutting down trees for inside use … lighting up the neighborhood, one twinkle-light at a time … filling the yard with larger-than-life inflated elves … let’s face it, holiday decorating hardly smacks of sustainability.

But last week, I visited the UNH greenhouses to learn how researchers are working to raise poinsettias in a way that’s a little gentler to the Earth. Greenhouse manager David Goudreault and extension specialist Brian Krug showed me around their impressive poinsettia display as they prepared for this weekend’s Poinsettia Trials Open House.

“We’re trying to minimize the chemical inputs we use to grow these poinsettias,” said Goudreault, who notes that all varieties of poinsettias — UNH has more than 80 on display right now — come from four main breeders then are grown locally. UNH utilizes integrated pest management, bringing in beneficial insects to eat harmful ones instead of spraying with pesticides. Krug says that for a commercial grower, spraying with pesticides can result in up to 12 hours of “down” time when workers cannot access the greenhouses. Plus, he says, “no one likes to suit up in a spray suit.”

UNH forgoes fungicides, too, instead planting in media with naturally occurring beneficial fungal organisms that protect the root systems. And Goudreault works to minimize the amount of water the plants need.

Krug is researching the feasibility of producing poinsettias — natives to Mexico and essentially tropical plants — at lower temperatures, which could be a boon to growers in New Hampshire and the Northeast. “It’s expensive to keep these greenhouses at 68 degrees,” he says.

Funded by the Agricultural Experiment Station, the UNH research greenhouses have at the core of their mission producing knowledge that will have a positive impact on the state’s agricultural economy. Sustainable poinsettia production is no exception. “Choosing production practices that reduce inputs of water, fertilizer or oil can save local growers money,” says Krug.

Check out UNH’s sustainable holiday decor at the popular Poinsettia Trials Open House this Thursday through Saturday at the greenhouses, and don’t miss the impressive poinsettia tree at the Whitt!

In the spirit of Thanksgiving and ensuring that local families have a happy and healthy holiday season, we here at UOS pooled our resources and recently donated a Cornucopia Food Basket filled with goodies like baking items, fresh eggs and milk, rice, cereal, and even a handmade Thanksgiving card. This spirit is not only at the heart of UNH’s Food & Society Initiative but all of our initiatives and work.

Especially in these rough economic times, it feels really good to partner with others and lend a helping hand to your fellow community members. And the sad truth is that even college students are going to food banks these days for sustenance.

We hope you and your family have a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with delicious, healthy (and local and organic if you can) food, time spent with those you love, and peace.

Today’s New York Times has a story about Broadway’s new effort to reduce its carbon footprint.

Just don’t mess with the Homer Simpson balloon at tomorrow’s parade!

On Wednesday, before I leave the office for four days of Thanksgiving feasting, I’ll be Doing the Right Thing and powering down — turning off and unplugging anything that blinks or beeps in my office. In my case, it will be as easy as turning off my power strip. If all my UNH colleagues follow suit, as the Energy Task Force has urged, we stand to save the university $20,000 in energy costs and the greenhouse gas emissions equivalent of removing 50 cars from the road for a year. So easy. So effective. What’s not to like?

Ironically, this annual call to power down comes as most of us are powering up for the six-week marathon of overeating, overspending, and over-promising known as the Holiday Season. Now, I’m all in favor of sleigh bells ringing and going a-wassailing (a-whatever a-that is), but so much of the hooplah around the holidays brings out the bah humbug in me. Then my inner Bah Humbug and my inner Martha Stewart get to fighting about making the holidays perfect, and let’s just say that the imaginary interior friend wielding a glue gun and knitting needles always wins.

So this year, I’m resolved to tap into two major trends — sustainable living and the economic downturn — to power down for the holidays.  The first and most obvious way to practice environmental and economic sustainability is, of course, to buy less stuff. UNH communications professor Sheila McNamee has suggestions for reining in gift-giving without going all Scrooge. For my part, I’m going to resist any competitive gift-giving, in which, for instance, I catch wind that my mother-in-law is giving me a laptop and I fly into a frenzy of credit card abuse to boost the value of my perfectly good gift to her.

McNamee’s suggestion to replace pricey “wow” gifts with extremely thought-out ones gives me pause, however, because frankly, time is still money. It’s a heckuva lot easier to buy my dad a shirt from a catalog than to collect all his childhood photos then set them to period music in a slide show. Two torturous hours in the mall might be more sustainable for my particular lifestyle than five days of scouting out locally made items.

To wit: one year, I knit a stockpile of tiny and heartbreakingly adorable Christmas stocking ornaments for all those I-should-really-give-a-gift occasions that ambush me while I’m looking the other way (usually at the buffet table): holiday parties, co-workers who surprise with a gift, dog-walking neighbors who leave tins of cookies on the doorstep, damn them.

Now, those wee ornaments were as economically and environmentally sustainable as they come, using leftover yarn from other projects. But I realized, as I knit away on a last-minute hat for a family member until the wee hours of Christmas Eve, perhaps I should have reserved my hard-won knitting time for those near and dear to me and doled out gift cards or scented candles to all the cookie-baking dog-walkers of my world.

So this holiday season, I’m going to try to power down by keeping my eyes on the prioritize. I’ll bake when I want to and when I’m sure that my shoo-fly pie is far superior to anything store-bought (it is); I’ll go to parties that really sound like fun; I’ll buy presents when it matters and may not buy anything for my kid, who’s already figured out that’s what Grandma is for; I’ll hand-make gifts for those for whom I truly care.

Anyone else care to share thoughts on powering down — or not — this holiday season?

Posted on behalf of our intern, Juliet Bluemling.

The $3.13 A Day Food Challenge began for me in September. (Find out all about the Challenge by clicking here!) Working with the University Office of Sustainability and as an assistant for the new Dual Major in EcoGastronomy, I was offered the opportunity to help put together one of the key components of the Challenge: Average food costs.

For me the cost of food has always been variable. Usually, it depends on how much money I have in my bank account, what the season is, or whatever I “feel” like making for dinner. Walking through the aisles of the grocery store, most of the time I can afford to buy local eggs versus conventional, try the more expensive, antioxidant and vitamin-packed orange juice, or splurge on the supplement that will give me 12 servings of my daily fruits and vegetables. Through the experience of creating these average food costs for the Challenge, I have realized how my lax purchasing is far from reality for some people on very tight budgets.

Working with the Dietetic Interns and Dr. Joanne Burke, we were able generate food prices from Market Basket, Hannaford, and Wal-Mart. Taking not the lowest prices of food, but the average, we calculated the cost per serving of the most common items in grocery stores and in the Dining Halls at UNH. You can find the final prices on the $3.13 A Day Food Challenge Website under the Food Price Guide.

Through the Challenge, it has been very fascinating and sometimes overwhelming to see how far off my daily food intake is from $3.13. I have realized the amount of creativity and resourcefulness required to maintain a balanced diet on such a small budget. It seems almost impossible, yet people are faced with this struggle each day. I think it will be fascinating and motivating to hear other participant’s responses to the Challenge and see the awareness it may bring to our campus and community.

In the UNH Dining Halls, they have resources for students and participants to try eating on a $3.13 A Day Diet. The Dietetic Interns have put together a poster as you walk into the dining hall with pictures that clearly show portion sizes and prices. Try a meal with the 3.13 number in mind; you won’t believe how quickly it all adds up. Here are some pictures from Holloway Commons.

The holidays are upon us. That’s right, although I find it hard to believe, next week is Thanksgiving (Already? I thought it was still weeks away…). And, as food is often a major part of holiday celebrations around the globe, it should be no surprise that this week at UNH and in the local area, food is taking center stage.

First there is the $3.13 a Day Food Challenge. The Challenge, which began on Saturday the 15^th and continues through Friday the 21^st, encourages the UNH community to eat “as healthy as possible on the limited budget of $3.13 a day”, which constitutes the average amount of money individuals receive from the Supplemental Food Assistance Program. As part of the University Dialogue on Poverty and Opportunity, the Challenge hopes to “raise awareness of the need for livable, workable wages,” “highlight the need for long term solutions to food disparity through food access,” and “provide the opportunity to reflect on the struggles faced by those with limited incomes.” Dual Major in EcoGastronomy intern Juliet Bluemling has been working with Dr. Joanne Burke to put together the Challenge, and she’ll be writing a piece for our blog about her work on this project later this week.

To help address some of the immediate needs of our local community, Durham’s Cornucopia Food Pantry is currently accepting “Baskets of Hope for Thanksgiving”, donations of food, money, or time to assist those in need. Our office, like others on campus, is putting together a basket filled with items requested on Cornucopia’s list.

Cornucopia will also be receiving farm-fresh donations this year, thanks to project work by UNH student Sarah Turner and a donation by Seacoast Slow Food. Items will be collected at this Saturday’s Holiday Farmers’ Market in Dover. (Check out Alison’s earlier blog post on this.) The market, which will include 40 area farmers and food producers with offerings like fall veggies, cheeses, meats, and more, will be held at McIntosh Atlantic Culinary Academy from 9am-2pm. Click here to learn more and see a list of vendors and products.

All in all, this week offers plenty of food for thought…and action. Click here to participate in the $3.13 a Day Food Challenge, donate your time, food, or money to Cornucopia, or support local farmers and food producers at the Holiday Farmers’ Market.

Here at the AASHE conference, opportunities for learning from others abound. There were sessions on measuring, reducing, offsetting, or sequestering your carbon … on meeting the President’s Climate Commitment and meeting with your president … on sustainable artwork and ecoliteracy … on buying food or paper clips with an eye toward sustainability.

I listened to several colleagues talk about changing attitudes on their campuses, an issue that speaks to my professional background in communication. Sustainability movements on campus and beyond have fairly effectively taught us that global warming and Hummers are bad, recycling and CFLs are good, and polar bears are in danger. But how many of us are changing our behavior accordingly? Sure, we’re willing to toss that soda can in the recycle bin and swap out our light bulbs, but don’t take away our parking spaces or our God-given right to buy lots of stuff cheap at discount stores. Yet many sustainability gurus argue that those cultural shifts are what’s needed to address the dire climate situation our world is in.

At the University of Colorado, they’re preaching beyond the choir to “make climate change personal” for students. They’ve moved from a message of “save energy because it’s good and virtuous” to one that aims to hit students more personally. Polar bears are a bit abstract, the organizers found in focus groups, but students at CU care quite a lot about skiing, hunting and fishing, three activities heavily affected by climate change. Posters and other communications on campus help students link their actions to the potential climate impact on these beloved pastimes. They’re also reaching into campus interest groups to bring the issues home. A scientist spoke at a pre-med society dinner, for instance, speaking about the connection between climate change and health outcomes.

A researcher from the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business is looking at applying marketing tactics to help transportation demand management (TDM) — which at its core aims to get people out of their individual cars –  succeed among employees.  Again, he stressed the importance of connecting the issue to the audience on a personal, not national level. Rather than a one-shot presentation at the employee benefits fair about TDM, he said, getting employees to embrace TDM involves social marketing and dialogue marketing, in which employees meet one-on-one with transportation managers who help them overcome barriers to relying less on their autos.

Speaking of parking and employee transportation, issues that resonate here at UNH, the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs described a pilot program they’ve implemented to address limited parking and the carbon and cash costs of employee commuting by flex time and telecommuting. Their version of OS staff work four ten-hour days, while their PAT-equivalent work at home one day. Employees in the pilot are discouraged from making Fridays and Mondays their day off or at home, both because those are days when parking needs are less and to counter the perception that folks aren’t working at home but taking three-day weekends. While the project is not perfect, it’s been overwhelmingly popular among those who are participating.

I’m returning from this conference with loads of ideas, inspiration, and connections from around the country. I look forward to hearing what my UNH colleagues learned.

Greetings from the bienniel conference of AASHE, the Association for Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, in Raleigh, N.C. I’m here with Tom, Sara, Brett and El from UOS, along with a few — say, nearly 2000 — colleagues working in and around sustainability in higher education around the U.S. and Canada. In the Life 2.0 spirit of Leave No Experience Undocumented, I’ll try to chime in with updates and observations over the next few days. In the frenzy of my dark-thirty departure Sunday morning I suffered camnesia, but here are a few literary snapshots of the scene here.

A no swag zone. I knew this conference would reinvent business as usual — the battle cry we’re hearing from speakers and presenters — when the organizers reminded us in advance that attendees should bring their own tote bags and water bottles, for they weren’t going to be provided. At registration Sunday afternoon, I was greeted not with a shoulder-crumpling bag stuffed with sponsor brochures that would go straight to the recycle bin (or, as they’re calling it here, “resource recovery center”) but rather with a slim booklet listing essential information. Funny, I don’t miss the tchochkes.

Sustainability is a big umbrella. I’ve been to plenty of conferences in my professional life, but never one that’s sold out. This one sold out last week. For perspective, AASHE’s first conference two years ago was about one-third as large, with 700 participants.  Perhaps more impressive than the volume of attendees is the variety, reflective of the way sustainability weaves itself into all aspects of campus life. In the past day and a half I’ve met students and sustainability professionals, professors and provosts, campus planners and energy managers, and a panoply of non-university folks who support campus sustainability efforts by designing green buildings, selling carbon offsets, sharing bicycles, installing waterless urinals, or suggesting sustainable study abroad programs. I’ve learned from experiences at other land-grant universities, Ivies, and community colleges alike — 400 institutions have representatives here.

But it’s raining really hard. There’s a palpable optimism here after last week’s election, but nonetheless, speakers are helping us understand that our warming world is in bad, bad shape. Keynote speaker Lester Brown likened our economy to Enron’s bookkeeping. As we’ve grown, polluted, and depleted resources, we’ve kept many of the true costs of business — the carbon that’s warming the world, the true costs of diminished health outcomes, for example — off the books. In his talk, Van Jones called for a new economic model, one that does not overprivledge our species at the dramatic expense of others and is not based on consumption rather than production.  We would do well, he said, to summon our grandmothers’ sage advice: “Just don’t waste everything. Just don’t be a fool.”