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Forum to assess environmental effort
Members of the university community are encouraged to again offer input on UB’s efforts to make its campuses “carbon neutral” as the university presents its draft “UB Climate Action Plan” at the Spring Sustainability Forum to be held from 10 a.m. to noon April 14 in the Student Union Theater, North Campus.
The plan was developed by the Environmental Stewardship Committee, which is charged with leading UB’s sustainability efforts.
As part of President John B. Simpson’s signing of the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment in March 2007, UB—and all of the 620 institutions of higher education nationwide that signed the commitment—must develop a plan by September 2009 to make their campuses carbon neutral, defined as having no net greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
Data gathered by the Environmental Stewardship Committee, as well as feedback received from the more than 200 faculty, staff and students who attended the First Sustainability Forum last October, have been incorporated into the draft climate action plan.
Participants in the second forum on April 14 will be asked to react to the draft plan, using clickers to submit their overall impressions. There also will be a full discussion of the plan, and participants are invited to offer further feedback via cards supplied at the forum or on the committee’s Web site.
Why should members of the university community attend the forum?
“Because they care about the environment and they want to make the [draft] document as powerful and useful as possible,” says Robert G. Shibley, chair of the Environmental Stewardship Committee and point person for UB’s comprehensive physical plan. “We want good feedback; we want to make sure the document is as well-informed as possible.”
The committee, he adds, will be using the forum to ask the question of “how are we doing” in the quest for climate neutrality.
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