HI, Jim
The University Faculty Senate Operations committee, under the leadership of
Maureen Dolan, has made a large proposal for the University to become more
"green," and also to take advantage of NYSERDA funds available to colleges
that comply with standards.  I brought a preliminary report to our campus a
couple of years ago and gave copies to various administrators.

I don't know what our local plan is but would be interested to hear about it
if anyone has information.
Janet


Dr. J. Nepkie
Professor of Music 
And Music Industry
Music Department
State University College
Oneonta, NY 13820
tele: (607) 436 3425
fax:   607 436 2718
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> From: Jim Greenberg <[log in to unmask]>
> Reply-To: Teaching Breakfast List <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Fri, 8 Jun 2007 12:00:09 -0400
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Fwd: TP Msg. #804 Live Green or Die - Can Engineering Schools "go
> green" Fast  Enough to Save Our Planet?
> 
> TBers,
> 
> I recently learned of a NYC initiative to reduce the carbon
> footprints of universities in the NYC area.  See:
> 
> http://www.stjohns.edu/campus/pr_uni_070607.sju
> 
> Anyone know if SUNY is going to participate in this?
> 
> In this spirit, the posting below looks at the growth of
> multidisciplinary sustainability programs on college campuses.   It
> is by Jo Ellen Meyers Sharp a freelance writer based in Indianapolis
> and is from the April 2007, Volume 16, No. 8. <http://www.asee.org/
> prism/>. © Copyright 2007 American Society for Engineering Education,
> 1818 N Street, N.W., Suite 600 Washington, DC 20036-2479. All rights
> reserved. Reprinted with permission.
> 
> 
> Live Green or Die - Can Engineering Schools "go  green" Fast  Enough
> to Save Our Planet?
> 
> Sustainable: (adj.) using resources so they are not depleted or
> permanently damaged.
> 
> Growing up in Oregon, Brianna Dorie never cared about eco-buzzwords.
> But she did treasure the environment-to the point it determined her
> career path. "I actually decided to become an environmental engineer
> after learning about the hole in the ozone layer as a kid," recalls
> Dorie, now a first-year doctoral student in environmental engineering
> at Purdue University, where she's researching the public-health
> impact of fire retardants in electronics and other products. "I
> thought at an early age that it could be fixed."
> 
> Dorie, a University of Portland civil engineering graduate with a
> master's in environmental engineering from the University of Arizona,
> is among a new generation of students eager to protect the planet.
> Their favored tool: green engineering. The eco-friendly focus has
> prompted the nation's engineering schools to examine their offerings
> and rethink overall educational philosophies to give conservation and
> sustainability the high priority the public and industry now demand.
> 
> Purdue's College of Engineering is a leader in revamping the
> curriculum to emphasize environmental considerations across
> disciplines. The goal is to infuse sustainability principles
> throughout courses and projects. Purdue's dean, Leah H. Jamieson,
> Ransburg Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, sees the
> new eco-focus as "an opportunity for engineering and science to be
> perceived as a profession that is very squarely in the realm of
> societal responsibility and meeting global challenges." Engineers
> have enhanced life with sewer systems and power grids. Now,
> "sustainability is part of the global discussion," notes Jamieson.
> 
> Such "grand challenges for humanity" help draw students like Dorie to
> engineering. Her research, for instance, focuses on public policy and
> the life cycle of brominated flame retardants, ubiquitous organic
> compounds that prevent pajamas, electronics and other items from
> catching fire. Elevated levels have been found in mammals, raising
> concerns about their toxicological effects. Some countries and states
> have banned their use. By analyzing the environmental impact of these
> "micropollutants" from manufacture through use, recycling and
> disposal, Dorie hopes to discover ways to reduce their potential harm.
> 
> Every year, Jamieson encounters students like Dorie who "want to
> improve the world." Many once hesitated to speak up for fear of
> ridicule. Today's campus, says Jamieson, is far more welcoming.
> Revamped, multidisciplinary courses have made students more aware of
> the role their work can play in tackling global problems. At Purdue's
> Global Sustainable Industrial Systems research center, for instance,
> projects include analyzing the ecological impact of everything from
> manufacturing to political processes.
> 
> "There's a real climate of collaboration right now," says Jamieson,
> who cites such factors as the increase in public interest, industry's
> need to meet environmental regulations and concerns over the
> availability and cost of oil and gas. Biofuels research is a prime
> example of this growing cooperation. It not only brings together such
> diverse disciplines as agricultural science, chemistry and
> engineering, but government and industry as well.
> 
> To foster collaboration and spur more engineering schools to address
> environmental issues, the National Science Foundation and the
> Environmental Protection Agency have funded research to develop
> benchmarks, methods and other best practices related to teaching
> sustainability. A $2 million federal grant, for example, supported
> the development of Carnegie Mellon University's new Center for
> Sustainable Engineering (CSE)-a partnership with the University of
> Texas at Austin and Arizona State University. The goal: help future
> engineers preserve scarce resources through faculty workshops, peer-
> reviewed educational materials and benchmarks to identify high-
> quality course content at the nation's 1,500 engineering programs.
> 
> "We are looking at all sustainable engineering programs to see what's
> out there, which schools have them and to determine best practices,"
> explains Carnegie Mellon civil and environmental engineering
> professor Cliff Davidson, CSE co-principal investigator. Engineers
> can no longer ignore arenas beyond their specialty, he says. Thus,
> CSE's partner institutions push students and faculty to develop
> solutions across traditional department lines. For example, Carnegie
> Mellon recently established a program to work with local leaders and
> businesses to restore abandoned industrial sites and other polluted
> "brownfields."
> 
> Part of the difficulty in promoting sustainable engineering, says CSE
> co-principal investigator Braden Allenby, professor of civil and
> environmental engineering and ethics at Arizona State's Ira A. Fulton
> School of Engineering, is that it tends to invite platitudes rather
> than practice. Federal grants, he says, will aid in "figuring out
> ways to do better engineering now and to train our students to
> consider the environmental and social implications of their actions."
> 
> Some students already are blazing the way. Carnegie Mellon doctoral
> student Shahzeen Attari, who is pursuing dual degrees in engineering
> and public policy and civil and environmental engineering, is typical
> of these multidisciplined minds. The public knows "something is wrong
> with the current system," Attari says. "The fact that we consume
> resources without taking the impact into consideration, the mounting
> effects of climate change and the fact we are no longer connected to
> the land all start adding up and start people thinking." Attari seeks
> to harness psychology to change behavior by creating messages,
> procedures and incentives that communities could use to persuade
> residents to reduce consumption of materials that emit carbon
> dioxide. Some sustainability messages already are raising public
> awareness, Attari notes, such as "buy local" and consume less.
> 
> "People like the freedom to choose their lifestyles, what they
> consume and when they consume it," observes Attari. "However, the
> environment is a 'commons' that we share with other citizens of the
> world, and when individual choices start negatively impacting others,
> we need to understand how to change or alter those behaviors."
> 
> Global Greening
> 
> Academia's increased focus on environmentalism spans the globe. The
> Institution of Engineers Australia, the country's accrediting body
> for engineering education, has taken the lead in addressing the
> paucity of environmental content. It spearheaded the formation of a
> nonprofit sustainability think-tank called the Natural Edge Project,
> which pools research from myriad engineering-school and environmental-
> group partners and posts relevant textbooks, scientific papers and
> research on its Web site, www.naturaledgeproject.net/. Recently, the
> organization began developing curricula with individual universities.
> 
> Although Australia includes sustainability in its national
> engineering graduate competency standards, the accrediting body found
> little to support the concept in the classroom. "Anecdotal evidence
> suggests strongly that the level of integration within Australian
> universities is still marginal, even within the environmental
> engineering degree programs, which have been traditionally observed
> as the leaders in this area," says Natural Edge Project education
> coordinator Cheryl Paten. She predicts demand for environmental
> expertise is bound to surge as the region's population explodes.
> "Australia has a significant opportunity to lead by example," she
> believes, by providing engineering graduates "with the tools that can
> really make a difference."
> 
> Closer to home, a dash of internationalism has made a big difference
> for undergrads at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis.
> For the past six years, groups have spent one week in Mannheim,
> Germany, touring corporations and local government offices in a three-
> credit course called GO GREEN. (The acronym stands for Green
> Organizations: Global Responsibility for Economic and Environmental
> Necessity.) Germany is a leader in sustainable development, and
> students return from overseas-host partner Berufsakademie Mannheim is
> a cooperative education university-with keener insights into the link
> between concept and commerce.
> 
> Most important, the students get to observe sustainability principles
> applied in daily life, from how employers conserve materials to "fair
> trade" products at grocery stores. "Students see how Germans recycle
> because it costs them money to throw things away," explains Patricia
> Fox, associate dean for administration and finance and assistant
> professor of organization leadership and supervision at the Purdue
> School of Engineering and Technology on the Indianapolis campus.
> "They come back asking 'Why aren't we doing this?' " Future engineers
> aren't the only undergrads learning to GO GREEN; the program includes
> majors in interior design, business, public and environmental
> affairs, art and communications.
> 
> These summer trips have spawned student as well as faculty reports on
> such topics as green roof designs, renewable energy, sustainable
> adhesives and the differences between sustainability practices in
> America and Europe. Several papers have been presented at the World
> Business Council for Sustainable Development conferences in Geneva,
> and at ASEE meetings.
> 
> Mechanical engineering student Michael Reed, a 2006 participant, says
> the Mannheim experience changed his career path. "Before this trip, I
> was certain that I wanted to use my degree for a career in
> manufacturing," he reflects. Reed now aims "to make a difference" in
> manufacturing. "I want to be one of the engineers who helps the
> United States become sustainable, along with the rest of the world."
> 
> Overseas travel "has definitely had an impact on the way I perceive
> life here in America and on the way I plan on conducting myself both
> personally and professionally," concurs Alan Benedict, another
> mechanical engineering student in the 2006 group. "I have never
> really considered myself wasteful. However, I have always measured my
> conduct against a very wasteful model. Now that I have been to
> Germany, I see waste in the United States where I did not see it
> before." Such revelations promise to transform engineering education
> even as it propels students like Benedict and Dorie toward greener
> frontiers, primed to protect Earth's future.
> 
> Jo Ellen Meyers Sharp is a freelance writer based in Indianapolis.
> 
> 
> Respectfully submitted to the TB List by,
> 
> Jim Greenberg