In an effort to gain more attention and feedback from the University population, the Office of Sustainability presented its Climate Action Plan to a small group of students from the Ecological Design Center last night.
The CAP is a requirement of the American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment, which was signed on April 16, 2007 by former University President Dave Frohnmayer.
Mark Nystrom, a graduate teaching fellow and CAP contributor from the Office of Sustainability, put together the University’s CAP with a goal and objective at achieving zero net carbon emissions on campus by the year 2050.
In a discussion with students from the EDC, Nystrom hoped to receive feedback and advice for revisions to new action plans. Nystrom first presented the CAP’s emission profile, breaking down the University’s total emissions through three scopes: on-site combustion, purchased electricity and air travel.
“When I first crunched the numbers, I never would have thought air travel would be so high,” Nystrom said. “Or that electricity would be so low.”
According to Nystrom’s calculations in the profile, air travel accounts for 31 percent of the University’s total greenhouse gas emissions. Purchased electricity came in at 13 percent of the total.
“We happen to have a super-clean electricity supplier,” Nystrom said, referring to the Eugene Water & Electric Board. “Clean in terms of carbon output, that is.”
Nystrom received some input when he questioned the students’ thoughts on the low commuting emissions, with many in the crowd blaming the lack of parking on campus.
“The commuting numbers are really good news to us,” Nystrom said. “I think the lack of parking isn’t a total accident.”
Josh Wilkinson, director of the Holistic Options for Planet Earth Sustainability committee and member of EDC, suggested Nystrom take new construction energy consumption into CAP’s emissions numbers, something that Nystrom said he had not taken into consideration before.
“When it comes to implementation, who has control over this?” Wilkinson asked.
Nystrom said there is no way to hold people accountable.
“It is up to us to argue that this is ethically correct and is a good thing for the University,” he said.
Jesse Crupper, administrative director for EDC, felt that there was a lot of room for “the hard things” the CAP should try to tackle.
“I saw a lot of room for more options we could focus on,” Crupper said. “I felt like education (for students) isn’t focused enough.”
Wilkinson also found more holes in the plan with respect to building protocol and design.
“If we add provisions to new construction, emissions could be reduced with design solutions,” Wilkinson said. “What it comes down to is the University administration has to have the balls to say how to build in a certain way.”
Nystrom will talk to students from the Academic Initiative Quality Circle and the Campus Recycling Program later this week, but he hopes that more student groups will take interest in something that will make a considerable difference to the University.
“We really need some feedback,” Nystrom said. “It’s just me sitting behind that computer, so I know there is a lot of fuzzy math, and I am sure we are missing some things.”
Crupper said he would like to hold a workshop for the CAP and the Office of Sustainability at the Holistic Options for Planet Earth Sustainability function in spring, an ecological design arts conference.
“Hopefully then we can put expert minds together to see what changes we can make,” Crupper said.
Nystrom considers CAP to be a living document and hopes students and student groups on campus review the plan and comment on the Office of Sustainability’s Web site before a new draft is presented to University President Richard Lariviere in December.
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