Jack Dodson is a part of the climate justice league. University of Oregon offers numerous clubs and organizations that support sustainability efforts. (Kemper Flood/Emerald).
Following nearly a decade of efforts to reduce carbon emissions on campus, University of Oregon campus leaders have said they’ve seen no results.
Currently, UO’s boiler system, which heats more than 80 buildings with nearly four miles of distribution tunnels on campus, is responsible for 49% of UO’s total emissions and is the largest single-source Greenhouse Gas emitter in Eugene.
UO primarily heats its campus using two large boilers powered by natural gas, with diesel as a backup.
These boilers, with capacities of 60 and 65 thousand pounds per hour, generate steam that travels through an underground pipe system to most campus buildings.
This system relies heavily on the burning of fossil fuels, which “currently releases just under 25,000 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually,” according to the 2024 Thermal Taskforce staff report.
8 years of advocating for a new heating system
In 2017, members of UO’s Climate Justice League, Thermal Transition Taskforce and the Associated Students of the University of Oregon proposed a climate action plan to former UO President Michael Schill.
The plan considered multiple different options for reducing UO’s GHG emissions.
At the time, no action was taken by the university after the proposal.
In 2019, the students wrote a letter to request additional action to the original climate action plan that was initially advocated for in the fall of 2017, according to the Campus Planning and Facilities Managment website.
Then, three years later, in 2022, former Interim President Patrick Phillips established the Thermal Transition Taskforce with 21 members to review the university’s thermal heating infrastructure and guide its next steps forward.
A preliminary assessment of the university’s heating system was conducted in collaboration with Affiliated Engineers, Inc.
AEI released a final report in late 2022, outlining four primary options to transition to a more sustainable heating system.
The first option was “systems as usual,” meaning no action would be taken, and UO would continue providing heat to campus through existing boilers.
The second option recommended a “conversion to an electrode steam boiler.”
Option three suggested focused on switching to a hot water distribution system.
Building on Option three, option four includes the addition of an alternative heat source.
In November of 2023, ASUO passed a resolution in support of Option 4.
ASUO Secretary of Sustainability Rachel Withers said, “As time passed, it (new heating system) became more and more glaringly obvious that it was not possible” because of financial restrictions.
As per the December 2023 Treasury Report to the Board of Trustees, “the total outstanding debt for the university is $846 million.”
Where do UO and campus leaders stand now?
In March of 2025, ASUO passed a resolution in support of Option 2B after, “ It became more and more glaringly obvious that it (Option 4) was not possible,” Withers said, because Option 4 was the initial resolution ASUO supported.
“The issue with a lot of the other ones (options) is that they (UO) were worried that the other options would become stranded assets. They put all this money into something, and then there would be a better option available,” Jack Dodson, an organizer for Climate Justice League, said.
According to Dodson, Option 2B takes part of the natural gas (fossil fuel) that contributes to climate change and converts part of that system to be on the electric grid, which gets its energy from the Eugene Water and Electric Board.
“It converts 54% of the system to just being on the (electric) grid. And now, of course, Oregon’s grid is not perfect, but it is a lot better than just 100% fossil fuels. So that would cut the emissions by 45%,” Dodson said.
Despite various meetings with UO President John Karl Scholz, Board of Trustees meetings, rallies, and seven years of advocacy, the university has yet to commit to an actionable resolution as members of Climate Justice League and students are not ‘entirely clear’ on why there is a delay, according to Dodson..
However, UO has shown the most support for Option 2B, which is the cheapest of the options suggested, according to several Board of Trustees meetings.
Students and members of Climate Justice League have shown “frustration” with the university’s lack of urgency in their action, according to Withers..
Withers said that the thermal task force was made up of mostly administration and expressed that she felt “pretty frustrated with the process” because “they’d (administration) be updating the numbers to be drastically different than…what they had said before during meetings.”
Dodson said that the timeline for installation depends on what the university decides to do for funding because “they may say we’re going to do this, but we need to raise money before we start installing it” or they could say, “we’re going to do this simultaneously.”
The current boiler system costs about $20,000,000 to operate annually, and “Option 2B increases annual operating cost by approximately $4.5 million in 2023 dollars,” according to the 2024 Thermal Taskforce staff report.
Dodson said that delaying this action “complicates things” and it is “better for the university if they take this in steps” because waiting will just make the shift more “difficult” since the state of Oregon has its climate goals and it expects the university to meet those by 2035.
Steve Mital, director of campus planning and facilities management, said that the lack of immediate action is “not an attempt to minimize our (university) responsibility. We’re (UO) working hard to find a financially viable way to join the global energy transition that is underway.”