Land Use & Built Environment Since January 2007 the University has been committed to meet USGBC LEED certification for all new and renovation building projects.
Energy The heating plant is undergoing renovations that meet both current and proposed environmental regulations.
Dining/Housing There are many ways dining is going green, including using recycled materials, utilizing locally raised animals and produce, using biodiesel in all vehicles, etc.
Water The University has aggressively pursued initiatives to conserve water and to develop creative opportunities for storm water management.
Administrative Commitment Since 1991 the University has continually committed itself to meeting and when able surpassing environmental standards.
Recycling This program has been awarded a 2007 Virginia Recycling Association Award for Excellence in the College/University category!
Transportation To help in the effort, Parking & Transportation offers programs that encourage biking, walking, public transportation, and carpooling.
"America is probably a generation late recognizing just how threatened we are by the accelerating and now obvious pace of contamination of air and water supplies, global warming, and the loss of sustainable space and living conditions for agriculture. Sustainability is an essential activity in any university that wants to be useful in the next generation."
- John T. Casteen III, President, University of Virginia
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The University will conduct all operations in an environmentally responsible manner and comply with all applicable State and Federal environmental regulations. Read More...
The recently released "Generate E: Reporting Campus Sustainability Leadership For The Next Generation" highlights the unique and critical role college students are playing in reforming sustainability programs that lower their campus' carbon footprint. The trayless dining initiative is featured in the report on page 38. Additional U.Va. programs, such as Chuck-it-for-Charity, are also cited as best-practice examples by the report.
Sustainability officials at the University of Virginia believe that supplying people with information can change their habits. Their latest tool is a "building dashboard," a kiosk that publicly displays utility consumption numbers in Newcomb Hall in real time, drawn directly from the building's own meters.
"The Nature of Cities" will have a Richmond premiere on Oct. 29 at 4:30 p.m. at the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden's Massie Auditorium. The screening is free and open to the public, and is being shown as part of the symposium "Timeless Design in a Sustainable World: The Charles F. Gillette Forum."
Recently featured in the films "Fresh" and "Food, Inc.," and honored last week with a $100,000 Heinz Award for creating environmentally friendly farming techniques, Salatin farms by harnessing relationships between grass, herbivores, birds and insects, and adapting those long-evolved synergies, which he calls "nature's template," to a family farm.
The goal of the floating classroom is to teach students of all ages how to steward the river and its resources, with the goal of making it swimmable and fishable by 2020. The Elizabeth River is one of the most polluted rivers on the Chesapeake Bay.
This fall, U.Va. Dining is rolling out the most recent innovation in sustainable eating on Grounds: the reusable to-go container. Details about the program are available here.
The Darden GreenPod is hosted by Erika Herz, Manager of Sustainability Programs for the Batten Institute at the University of Virginia's Darden School of Business. The program covers a wide range of topics with leading scholars and professionals concerning the principles and practices of environmental sustainability.
"America is probably a generation late recognizing just how threatened we are by the accelerating and now obvious pace of contamination of air and water supplies, global warming, and the loss of sustainable space and living conditions for agriculture. Sustainability is an essential activity in any university that wants to be useful in the next generation."
The University will conduct all operations in an environmentally responsible manner and comply with all applicable State and Federal environmental regulations. Read More...
