Second Nature Blog Newsletter

Plains, Trains, and Sustainability: Regional Collaborations with UMACS and NWF Campus Ecology

By Axum Teferra, Kresge Membership and Engagement Fellow

This year, Second Nature partnered with the Upper Midwest Association for Campus Sustainability (UMACS) and National Wildlife Federation- Campus Ecology (NWF) for Second Nature’s first Midwest Regional Collaborative Symposium.The event took place from November 7^th-9^th, 2013 at Luther Collegein Decorah, Iowa, and integrated an ACUPCC (American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment) Pre-Conference for both signatory and non-signatory institutions.

Second Nature staff members chose to ride the rails from Massachusetts to Iowa in order to minimize the group’s carbon footprint. This 32-hour train ride took the team through many states and landscapes, ending at Luther College in Decorah, the Iowa town nestled in a 470 million year-old crater.  

View of wind turbine adjacent to the Luther College campus in Decorah, Iowa

Second Nature Staff

by Ashka Naik, Director of ACUPCC Initiatives, Second Nature

As of November 2013, 616 signatory institutions have submitted 1998 GHG Inventories in total.

616 institutions have submitted at least one GHG report.  492 institutions have submitted at least two GHG reports, with which we have datasets to analyze trends of emission within the ACUPCC network.

Figure 1: The following figure highlights the breakdown of how many GHG reports have been submitted by signatory institutions.

The 492 institutions that have submitted at least two GHG reports present the following trends on their GHG emissions.

• 286 (58%) of the 492 signatory institutions show a reduction totaling 2,898,816 metric tons of CO2e. 
• 198 (40%) of the 492 signatory institutions show an increase of 1,196,815 metric tons of CO2e. 
• 8 of the 492 signatory institutions show no change in their emissions.
• The cumulative emissions reduction from these 492 signatory institutions is 1,702,001 metric tons of CO2e.

By Sarah Brylinsky, Director of Climate Resilience & Educational Programs

Join Second Nature at the 14th National Council for Science and the Environment (NCSE) Conference "Building Climate Solutions", in Washington D.C., January 28th-30th.

Visit the conference website to register or find out more about this unique and action-oriented event, and be sure to join us for a symposium and breakout workshop to develop an action-plan for supporting resilience efforts in higher education.

Preparing Campuses and Communities for a Changing Climate
2014 NCSE Workshop, Second Nature

Higher education has already taken a successful leadership role in climate mitigation through the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC), with nearly 700 campus committed to achieving climate neutrality (not net carbon emissions).

by Timonthy White, Chancellor, California State University System and Chair of the ACUPCC Steering Committee

The ACUPCC is entering its 7th year in full force. Today, this network—comprised of 673 colleges and universities—represents 6,413,193 students. And as it grows, these institutions continue making remarkable progress towards addressing sustainability and climate issues on their campuses across the country, both in institutional operations and curriculum development. To date:

• Collectively, ACUPCC signatories report an annual cumulative reduction of 328,698 metric tons of CO2e emissions. In addition to producing a combined 444,300,134 kWh of renewable energy annual, which is the equivalent of powering 46,928 American households every year.
• Three signatories—College of the Atlantic (ME), Colby College (ME), and Green Mountain College (VT)—have achieved carbon neutrality, and 44 more have set a target date within the next ten years .
• More than 180 signatories have established programs to encourage student climate and/or sustainability research, 82 signatories have included sustainability learning outcomes in institutional General Education Requirements, and 108 signatories offer professional development to all faculty in sustainability education.
• Collectively, 144 signatories have secured funding from outside sources totaling over $309 million, and 209 signatories reported savings from implemented CAP projects totaling $144.5 million.

For more details on progress made by the ACUPCC, read the latest Progress Summary of June 2013.

by Ashka Naik, Director of ACUPCC Initiatives, Second Nature

As of September 2013, the ACUPCC reporting system has 1990 Greenhouse Gas Reports, 521 Climate Action Plans and 328 progress reports. As we look deeper into these publicly shared data—submitted by more than 670 institutions over the course of 5.5 years of the initiative—what we see is an intricate picture that is telling of the overall progress made by the US higher education sector in its pursuit to create a sustainable and thriving society. These outcomes can also educate us about the challenges and opportunities confronting our institutions.

In this blog series, we will highlight trends and patterns that emerge from these publicly submitted reports. Our goal in sharing these chronicles is twofold. It is to share the network’s impact by leveraging the power of data. But more importantly, it is to underscore how a committed community of “doers” at higher education institutions has brought this extraordinary higher education sustainability movement to life.

Analyzing submitted reports by Carnegie Classification reveals how different types of institutions are advancing in their Commitments to climate neutrality.

Figure 1: The above chart highlights how different Carnegie Classifications are represented within the ACUPCC.

Figure 2: The above chart highlights how different Carnegie Classifications are represented within the entire US higher education sector.
[Source: http://classifications.carnegiefoundation.org/summary/basic.php,
Accessed September 23, 2013].

by Gabriela Boscio, Program Associate, Second Nature

“For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love.”
― Carl Sagan

(This post is part of a series by the Second Nature team about why we do what we do.)

How does love grow? When do you know it has taken root? How can you pinpoint its beginning?

My passion for sustainability is something that’s been growing within me for most of my life, and I am not sure exactly when or why it started. As a child, I loved plants and animals. I loved reading about them and learning about them, and I loved observing nature. I remember thinking in grade school that I wanted to be a scientist when I grew up, because I wanted to keep learning about nature, through exploration and investigation. My family supported and encouraged this love by providing me with copious amounts of nature books, magazines and collectible wildlife fact cards, as well as by spending time with me outdoors, and putting up with my incessant animal-factoid sharing (“Did you know baby cheetahs chirps like birds?”).

Example of a book from my childhood. Joyce Rogers Wolkomir and Richard Wolkomir. 1992.

By Jario Garcia, Kresge Implementation Fellow, Second Nature

By Preston Jacobsen, Sustainability Analyst, Haywood Community College

(This article appears in the May, 2013 issue of The ACUPCC Implementer)

Haywood Community College (HCC) has a rich history of sustainability. When President Rose H. Johnson arrived in January 2006 she made sure sustainability was a strategic imperative for the college. In May of 2007 President Johnson signed the ACUPCC, committing HCC to the far-reaching goal of eliminating its operational greenhouse gas emissions, supporting the educational opportunities for students to advance a low carbon society and to publicly report progress on an annual basis. To support the goals of the ACUPCC and other sustainability efforts, HCC also joined AASHE, participates in AASHE's STARS program, and is a member of the Sustainability Education and Economic Development (SEED) Center. In order to be successful in its sustainability endeavors, President Johnson implemented a cross-campus team based approach to enhance and integrate educational offerings with the campus' day-to-day operations. To coordinate this effort HCC hired an Energy Manager and a Sustainability Technician to oversee the sustainability projects, grants, and initiatives of the college. In 2009, President Johnson extended her sustainability leadership beyond the campus by partnering with President Rusty Stephens and Wilson Community College to create the CODE Green Initiative. CODE GREEN is a North Carolina Community College System (NCCCS) initiative to develop and promote Sustainable programs across all 58 NCCC's through curriculum and campus development. 

By Gabriela Boscio, Sustainability Capacity Building Intern at Second Nature 

All through Earth Month, finalists of the 2013 Second Nature Climate Leadership Awards vied for the most votes on the video they produced. Each of these 2-3 minute videos highlights the innovative sustainability efforts on their campuses. Voting was held through Planet Forward's website and ran from April 1 to April 30, 2013. Read the press release for more details.

After a total of 48,882 votes cast during the month-long period of public voting, the winner of this year's 2013 Climate Leadership Awards Video Competition is Missouri University of Science and Technology. This Doctorate Granting Institution garnered 16,374 votes, making it the top vote earner overall and in its Carnegie classification.

Missouri S&T’s entry features the university’s Solar Village, a neighborhood of student-built solar houses that acts as a living lab and home for students and faculty. The video also highlights their geothermal energy project, which will reduce the campus’s carbon dioxide emissions by 25,000 tons per year and cut energy usage in half.