Sustainable Campus
Sustainable UIC (Final Draft)
To,
Mark Donovan
Vice Chancellor for Administrative Services,
Office of Facilities Management, UIC
Introduction:
Sustainable is an adjective that should describe every institution in this 21st century, but unfortunately, in an objective analysis of many institutions, it rarely does. The purpose of this paper is to provide a preliminary blue print, made for the University of IL at Chicago, which can be easily modified and applied to any urban academic campus. In today’s highly politicized world, there are many misconceptions about sustainability. For example, many believe that sustainability doesn’t consider human comfort or high cost for application. However, sustainability is a conservative idea that not only saves the environment, but much too many administrations’ pleasure saves money. Sustainability also is based on the idea that by saving resources and decreasing the amount waste will increase not only current generations’ but also future generations’ standard of living. Just as the United Nations’ definition of sustainability states, “Sustainability is meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (UN and Sustainibility ). There are five main principles behind the Idea: Respect life, Live within Limits, Value the local economy, Account for full costs, and Share Power (UN and Sustainibility ). In this proposal, the solutions incorporating these principles and their implementation processes will be stated.
Problem:
In recent years, UIC has opened the Office of Sustainability and has been taking steps to improve the conditions on campus, which can proved us with the foundations needed for the future actions. While the office of sustainability at UIC has been working hard, based on the data collected by the Associate Chancellor of Sustainability, Cynthia Klein-Banai, the UIC has greenhouse gas emission of 300,000 Metric ton CO2 equivalents per year
To,
Mark Donovan
Vice Chancellor for Administrative Services,
Office of Facilities Management, UIC
Introduction:
Sustainable is an adjective that should describe every institution in this 21st century, but unfortunately, in an objective analysis of many institutions, it rarely does. The purpose of this paper is to provide a preliminary blue print, made for the University of IL at Chicago, which can be easily modified and applied to any urban academic campus. In today’s highly politicized world, there are many misconceptions about sustainability. For example, many believe that sustainability doesn’t consider human comfort or high cost for application. However, sustainability is a conservative idea that not only saves the environment, but much too many administrations’ pleasure saves money. Sustainability also is based on the idea that by saving resources and decreasing the amount waste will increase not only current generations’ but also future generations’ standard of living. Just as the United Nations’ definition of sustainability states, “Sustainability is meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (UN and Sustainibility ). There are five main principles behind the Idea: Respect life, Live within Limits, Value the local economy, Account for full costs, and Share Power (UN and Sustainibility ). In this proposal, the solutions incorporating these principles and their implementation processes will be stated.
Problem:
In recent years, UIC has opened the Office of Sustainability and has been taking steps to improve the conditions on campus, which can proved us with the foundations needed for the future actions. While the office of sustainability at UIC has been working hard, based on the data collected by the Associate Chancellor of Sustainability, Cynthia Klein-Banai, the UIC has greenhouse gas emission of 300,000 Metric ton CO2 equivalents per year
Cited: Klain-Banai, Cynthia. "UIC State of Sustainibility." February 2010. UIC, Office of Sustainability. Document. November 2012. Office of Sustaiability, Carlton College. Sustainability at Carleton. 2012. Website. 2012. UIC office of Sustainability. "UIC CLimate Action plan." 2011. UIC, Office of Sustainability. November 2012. UN and Sustainibility . 2012. http://www.un.org/en/sustainability/. 2012.