Evaluating Sustainability Efforts at the University Level

The University of Cincinnati, similar to many other major universities in the United States, has hopped on the “green” bandwagon.   By doing so, they hope to attract new students, new faculty, and even new sources of financing.  I know when I was graduating from high school, a whole twenty minutes away from Clifton, I had no idea what sustainability even meant, yet alone that UC had been working for several years already on their sustainability initiatives.  Several examples of these initiatives include: UC’s free shuttle system, requirement of LEED building standards on all new construction and renovation, having a school sponsored community garden, purchasing sustainably produced products, campus wide recycling capabilities, and even installing green roofs on a couple buildings found on campus.

These are all examples of specific policy instrument choices used by the University to help achieve sustainability, or at least the image that they are trying to do so.  One policy instrument is the market based approach.  In general the market based approach has the least government interference and leads to things such as tax breaks, subsidies, and low levels of regulation.  An example of one of UC’s sustainability initiatives that fits this approach is its community garden.  It is maintained by a few student employees of the Office of Sustainability, and it is completely open for anyone to come and work in.  With its basic level of autonomy, the garden essentially runs itself and teaches people who visit the basics of tending their own garden, how to compost, and the basic approaches to living their lives more sustainably (e.g. buying from your local farmer at farmer’s markets, increasing the amount of plant based foods in your diet). 

Of course, there are several advantages and disadvantages to this policy instrument.  An advantage is that the hand off approach leads to more innovation and personal responsibility.  The few people who run the garden are free to construct whatever lesson plans they choose and they decide how to teach those members of the public who come to the garden in order to learn something.  The community also learns how to be dependent on them for a basic necessity like food, if they do in fact return home from the community garden and start their own backyard or even a windowsill garden.  On the other hand, having a small community garden causes some problems because it is what it is, small.  The word may not get out very effectively and there could be only a small percentage of the total participation there could be if indeed it was more regulated and invested in by the university.

Another specific policy tool is the law-based instrument.  Usually this occurs when an individual or individuals claim they were harmed in some way, the case goes to court, and then the result is punitive action and monetary results.  In 2001, when I was a mere fourth grader at Maddux Elementary, the University of Cincinnati created the Sustainable Design Policy.  This entailed that whenever possible, the institution would build all new construction and renovations to LEED silver standards or higher.  According to the Office of Sustainability’s page building initiatives “The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System™ is the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction, and operation of high performance 'green' buildings.”  Since 2004, UC has completed 6 LEED certification constructions/remodels, including one with a Gold and one with a Silver rating.  They do this in efforts to lower the carbon footprint of the university.  Examples of differences in LEED construction are the emphasis on energy efficiency in the new buildings and the construction/remodeling with sustainable materials. 

Like all policies, there are the upsides, and the fallbacks as well.  One advantage of this approach is that it creates precedent for future development.  With the number of buildings that UC has in such a small space, the dream of the continual construction of new buildings is not a rational one.  Therefore, it is necessary ensure that the remodeling (which happens almost every year now) of older buildings make them more environmentally conscious.  Even if it is only replacing the heating source for the boiler in the basement, every little step counts.  Like the Sustainability’s website says, built construction is responsible for over 80% of the campus’s greenhouse gas emissions.  There are some disadvantages as well however.  For example, harm is stable able to continue despite efforts to alleviate the issues.  Sure, the University is remodeling for the sake of development and progress, but the materials are still being produced in manufacturing facilities, then they are shipped either over land or sea, and finally installed in the building being updated.  The stretch of emissions can literally be tracked over hundreds if not thousands of miles.

            The major goal of UC’s sustainability initiatives is to be completely carbon neutral by 2050.  This essentially means not using any carbon-based fuels for energy, so no fossil fuels, including coal and oil.  As far as I know, this goal of carbon neutrality only pertains to energy consumption, not pertaining to consumption (e.g. goods and services purchased and provided by the university).  This seems like quite a lofty goal, but in reality it will be very doable with current sustainability initiatives in place, and the subsequent ones in the future. 

This approach however, usually brings along the most critics.  With such lofty goals, the skeptics quickly come out of the closet.  Already planning on shutting down one coal burner by 2014 if memory serves me right, UC has made a step in the right direction as far as this author is concerned.  But with one less coal burner, the supply for energy needs to come from some source.  Most people point toward natural gas, which although it is certainly cleaner than coal, is not carbon neutral and also has had its own history of negative environmental impacts.  More now than ever, wind power is becoming readily accessible, but at this point in time the capabilities would only make up a small percentage of total energy needed.  For this goal to be attainable and silence the critics, much more will need to be invested into the energy sector of UC’s sustainability initiatives.