TravelSmart Gains National Attention
By Melanie Stewart
As you have hopefully heard, the active transportation goal in the Sustainability Master Plan was achieved early…six years early. Our success is largely due to the TravelSmart program.
TravelSmart is an inclusive program that not only encourages active transportation use, but also provides incentives/amenities for the user while removing common barriers. The jump in active transportation on this campus is impressive anywhere, but especially in a city that only has one form of public transportation and has minimal gridlock.
We’ve known this, but now others are noticing too.
This month TravelSmart was one of only 36 selected campuses featured in the APPA’s national publication Facilities Manager in their “Sustainability Best Practices” issue. You can read it here, on page 29.
Next month I will be presenting TravelSmart at Practice Greenhealth’s CleanMed conference, one of only two presentations selected to present on transportation.
Are you ready to be a TravelSmartie? Would you like to save money? Are you looking for ways to fit more exercise in your day? Would you like to reduce pollution and traffic congestion in Omaha?
Whether it’s walking, taking the bus, biking, carpooling or a combination of modes, active transportation helps keep you healthier AND makes our community healthier by cutting down on greenhouse gas emissions, which affects the health of the entire Metro, but especially those with asthma, COPD and other lung ailments.
Did you know? TravelSmart offers….
- FREE parking for carpoolers (in your same lot, or better!)
- FREE bus passes
- FREE indoor bike parking, shower, and locker access for cyclists and walkers
- FREE emergency ride home if needed
- FREE carpool matchingif you need help finding a carpool partner, and
- Convenient $3 daily-rate flexible parking.
Please note that you do NOT have to give up your current parking permit, nor do you need to use active transportation every day to participate in TravelSmart or see the financial benefits.
Did you know?
- Moms and dads with kids to drop-off and pick-up use TravelSmart
- Students and colleagues with inconsistent schedules use TravelSmart
- Business professionals use TravelSmart
… and so can YOU!
*We encourage any employee or student to use active transportation. However, please note that only employees and students at the 42nd and Dewey campus are currently eligible for TravelSmart.
If you are interested in active commuting but don’t think it will work for you, contact me. I will be happy to help you with trip planning.
Earth Day Events Announced
By Melanie Stewart
In the past we have always celebrated what we called “Earth Week”; events on campus for you to attend and gain personal knowledge and benefits, during the week between Earth Day and Arbor Day.
We have always asked for your feedback and last year many of you noted that it was difficult to attend events on back to back days. You also wanted to make sure that events stayed fresh, but that we continued to collect your personal electronics/batteries/techno trash for recycling and shredded your personal documents.
You asked and we listened!
We are going to spread events out throughout the month, now celebrating Earth Month, so it’s easier for you to make plans and attend.
We will still have the popular recycling/shredding event for your personal items. As before, we will host this on 2 days at different times to try and help fit a variety of schedules. Almost all items are free, but for costs and details (some of which have changed) please visit our website.
We will celebrate Arbor Day on the 27th with a tree planting, tree/wildflower seed giveaway, and will have Master Gardener Susan Siebler on hand to answer your questions.
We have two new events this year!
Free outdoor Yoga classes brought to you by the Center for Healthy Living.
UNO Sustainability Coordinator Sarah Burke will be sharing tried-and-true homemade recipes for cleaning/personal care items–reduce your exposure to chemicals and save money. This event will be offered 3 dates/locations for your convenience, click here for details.
The RePurpose It Contest is going to take a break, but will be back next year. Projects can be completed at any time, just take before and after pictures to share next spring and win prizes. For inspiration, check out previous year’s entries and/or our Pinterest page.
The Sustainability Expo is going to be co-hosted with UNO Sustainability. It’s free for your to attend every year, but each campus will host it on an every-other-year basis.
We are also going to highlight community events as well as sustainability-oriented Nebraska Scifest events that you and/or your family may be interested in attending. Please see our Earth Month webpage for dates, details, and links to specific information.
Hope to see you during Earth Month!
It’s PENdemonium
By Melanie Stewart
When your pen writes its last word or your highlighter goes dark, it’s easy to just toss it in the trash can. It’s so small and weighs next to nothing, so it doesn’t count for anything, right?
Nope.
By itself, it may not seem like much but when approximately 20,000 employees and students at all of our locations use some kind of writing utensil on a daily basis they start to add up. I am happy to prove this to you.
Instead of mailing in full boxes on their own, areas/departments that collect writing utensils now send them to the Office of Sustainability where they are packaged into specific box with a prepaid shipping label. We have to purchase this box as a way to offset recycling costs. To save money on boxes as well as use fewer resources in shipping we wanted to make sure we fit every pen into this box that we could. Rather than dumping pens in, creating a “pick-up-sticks” situation with lots of dead space we (and by “we” I mostly mean LiveGreen Ambassador Theresa Pikschus) devised a way to line them up.
Last week we filled our first box of writing utensils to send in. We didn’t count the entire box, that’s too crazy even for me, but a quick calculation estimates that there were at least 6,000 pens in the box with a total weight of 102lbs. That’s a lot of pens that aren’t becoming litter or sitting in the landfill. If you need a visual, that’s a box that’s 15 inches square and 3 feet tall.
If you’ve been throwing your writing utensils away, don’t fret, you can start participating now. Check out our webpage for all the details you need to know.
As always, reduction and reuse are still best…and generally cheaper. Only buy writing utensils that people will actually use and in a quantity that will be used before they dry out. Consider pens that takes refills and mechanical pencils that just need lead instead of single-use versions.
Don’t ever feel like small actions taken by an individual don’t matter. Yes, big savings can be more flashy, but individuals making choices to make their lives and this planet better can really add up. Whether it’s a pen being recycled, the decision to stop sucking, or refilling a cup instead of buying a plastic bottle, it all helps.
New Sustainability Campus Engagement Goal
by Melanie Stewart
If you read last week’s 2017 Sustainability Master Plan Metric update, you noticed that we have made some progress on our Sustainability Engagement Score (SES), which is great news.
The SES is calculated using the answers to several questions in our biannual sustainability survey, the most recent of which was completed last fall. We gauge what colleagues and students know about sustainability, what sustainability actions they participate in, as well as those around them. This is then calculated into an overall engagement score, with the highest point total possible being 100. Here is the latest update:
CAMPUS ENGAGEMENT
- Baseline: Sustainability Engagement Score is 45 (out of a possible 100)
- Goal: Achieve a Sustainability Engagement Score of 75 by the end of 2023
- Progress: Current Sustainability Engagement Score is 59
We will need to have a high rate of engagement in order to meet our ambitious, updated, goals in emissions/energy, waste, water, and active transportation. In light of that need and in order to align the goal timeline with the other goals, a new goal has been approved:
Achieve a Sustainability Engagement Score of 85 by 2030.
A score of 85 is high making hitting that mark, especially by 2030, an ambitious goal as well. That said, I’m confident we can make it. I’ve spoken with so many of you who understand how important sustainability is and how it is connected directly to our mission of “creating a healthy future for all individuals and communities.”
If you want to be more involved, considering becoming a LiveGreen Ambassador. We don’t have regular meetings to worry about, and it’s a good way for you to get information, share it with colleagues, as well as provide feedback to the Office of Sustainability. If now isn’t a good time, the opportunity will always be available to you.
Thank you for all you do to help in reducing energy/emissions, conserving water, using active transportation, reducing/reusing/recycling, and all of the other “little” things you do that add up! Sometimes those actions seem small, but don’t discount them. Small acts done repeatedly create an impact on their own, and as more people do so, it will become the norm leading others to change their habits too. I look forward to attaining these goals with all of you as we move forward.
Sustainability Master Plan Metric Update
By Melanie Stewart
Attaining the TravelSmart goal early was a huge success; if you aren’t a TravelSmartie, I hope you will consider becoming one. Transportation is just one of the six goal areas in the Sustainability Master Plan, but all are important to our mission.
We are excited to release our 2017 Metric Update, an easy-to-read report containing a metric update, explanation, and specific initiatives contributing to those numbers. I hope you’ll take a look at it, but here’s a brief synopsis:
EMISSIONS
- Baseline: Produced 153,964 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2eq) each year.
- Goal: Achieve net zero building emissions by 2030.
- Progress: Produced 125,825 metric tons of CO2eq.
Efforts to reduce emissions have led to a cumulative reduction of 179,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide, equivalent to the annual emissions of 19,300 homes.
WATER
- Baseline: 225,164,787 gallons of water per year
- Goal: Reduce annual gallons of water used by 54% by 2030.
- Progress: Used 193,446,478 gallons.
Cumulative water reduction is 189,600,000 gallons, equivalent to 287 Olympic-sized swimming pools.
MATERIALS/WASTE
- Baseline: 25% of materials diverted from landfill.
- Goal: Zero Waste by 2030.
- Progress: 23% of materials diverted.
Waste reduction and recycling efforts have led to 2.1 million pounds of material not going to the landfill since 2012.
CAMPUS PLANNING
- Goal: Maintain current density of 73,326 gross square feet of built space per developed acre by 2023
- Progress: 55,513 square feet of built space per developed acre
TRANSPORTATION
- Baseline: 12% of employee/student commutes use active transportation mode (walk, bike, bus, or carpool)
- Goal: 20% of employee/student commutes use active transportation mode by 2023
- Progress: 22% of campus employees/student
- New Goal: 35% of commutes use active transportation by 2030
CAMPUS ENGAGEMENT
- Baseline: Sustainability Engagement Score is 45 (out of a possible 100)
- Goal: Achieve a Sustainability Engagement Score of 75 by the end of 2023
- Progress: Current Sustainability Engagement Score is 59
We will need to have a high rate of engagement in order to meet our ambitious, updated, goals. In light of that and in order to align the Engagement goal timeline with the other goals, a new goal has been approved:
Achieve a Sustainability Engagement Score of 85 by 2030.
Thank you for helping to reduce energy/emissions, conserve water, reduce/reuse/recycle, and all of the other little things you do that add up! If you want to be more involved, considering becoming a LiveGreen Ambassador.
Impressive Milestone Reached Ahead of Schedule
By Melanie Stewart
When the Sustainability Master Plan (SMP) was released, 12% of people on the 42nd Street campus used active transportation to commute. The SMP ambitiously set a goal to increase trips made to and from campus using active transportation to 20% by the year 2023.
Campus growth expedited the need as new buildings took the place of some parking spaces, and those buildings now bring even more colleagues to campus. Parking structures and lots are exceedingly expensive to build (did you know that it costs more than $25,000 per stall when building a parking garage?!?) and even more dollars to maintain, light, and snowplow. Building more parking was not proactive, cost-efficient, or in-line with the SMP goals, so the innovative TravelSmart program was born.
Since June of 2015 thousands of colleagues and students have registered to participate. They have ridden the bus, walked, biked, and carpooled to receive free parking, reduce emissions, be healthier, reduce stress, and save money.
I am excited to tell you that we have hit our 20% goal! Six years ahead of schedule 22% of trips to campus are being made by active transportation!
While those participating see immediate benefits, everyone else benefits too! By using active transportation, hundreds of cars don’t come to campus each day. That means less congestion on campus and on city streets, less road repair or need for expansion, and a lot less pollution. Decreasing pollution improves air quality in Omaha and benefits all of us, but especially those with asthma, COPD, and other lung ailments. Creating a healthy future for all individuals and communities is our mission.
Using only the data you provided in our sustainability survey last fall, we know that we have reduced single-occupant vehicle miles by more than 29,000 miles per week! That’s a lot…1.2 trips around the equator each week and 6.3 round trips to the moon each year; and all of the emissions associated with those miles.
That’s fantastic! Others might call it good and bask in this glory…but that’s not how we roll here. Improving health is our mission and we know that our campus will continue to grow. I’m excited to tell you that we have updated our goal and our timeline: 35% of trips to campus using active transportation by the year 2030. This goal is ambitious too, but worth it, and aligns with our other 2030 goals.
Considering TravelSmart? You don’t have to use active transportation every day or give up your parking permit (but you can to save money!). If you have any questions or need help with a bus route or finding a carpool partner, let us know.
Plan, Shop, and Chop to Reduce Food Waste
By Melanie Stewart
If you were one of the millions of people who made a resolution, there’s a decent chance it involved being healthier, and that often starts with eating more fruits and vegetables, and less pre-packaged foods.
In January we talked about the crazy amount of food that is wasted; the amount of money we spend on food we never eat, the resources that it took to produce that food, and amount of space in the landfill it takes up. We also provided resources on decipher dates on food packaging as well as food storage tips.
As noted, it’s easy to buy good food but then they go south once they are out of sight, out of mind. How can you prevent this, and save yourself some money? LiveGreen and the NRDC have some tips:
- Meal plan. Be honest about when you are going to cook, how many people you will be feeding, and what those people will actually eat.
- Make a list and stick to it. It’s shocking to me that only 25% of Americans go to the store with a list?! The good news: those that do spend less, make less impulse buys, and make fewer trips to the store. That’s a win-win-win!
- If you only need small quantities of certain items, only buy that quantity.
- Consider stores that have dry goods in bulk bins allowing you to measure out only what you need/can store.
- You can also use the salad bar to get a variety of (pre-chopped!) veggies for a specific recipe. It may cost a little more, but it’s cheaper than buying a dozen different vegetables and only eating half.
- Check the fine print; even if the sale says you get 5 for $5, you often don’t have to purchase that many to get the discounted price.
- Buy “Ugly Fruits and Vegetables.” The imperfections are cosmetic, the nutrition is the same, and if they aren’t purchased, the store trashes them.
- Try the “Shop and Chop”: when you come home for the store, items that need to be prepped don’t go into the fridge until they are washed and cut. Your strawberries are easy to grab and take to work with you in the morning…we both know it won’t happen when trying to wrangle everyone out the door.
These few easy tips can keep your healthy eating on the right track and keeping your pocketbook happy.
photo credit: freeimages.com/ramzihashisho
Clear the Air
From work to school to home, we spend up to 90% of our time indoors. While it seems like this would protect you from the pollution outside, and that’s somewhat true, many of us don’t know that the air inside our homes is 2-5 more polluted than the air outside.
Formaldehyde. Benzene. Trichloroethylene. Toluene. Methylene chloride. They come from plywood and pressed-wood products, furniture, carpeting, cigarette smoke, new permanent-press clothing, paints, adhesives, and solvents. Even tightly closed paint cans leak VOCs (volatile organic compounds). These chemicals worsen asthma and other lung ailments and have been shown to cause cancer. They can build up in our homes and this is amplified during the winter months as doors and windows are kept closed.
Even our cleaning products can be hazardous. Products containing VOCs and other toxic substances can include:
- Aerosol spray products
- Air fresheners
- Chlorine Bleach (with heat it vaporizes to form chloroform, mixed with ammonia it forms chlorine gas)
- Detergents
- Dry cleaning chemicals
- Rug and upholstery cleaners
- Furniture and floor polish
- Oven cleaners
In warm weather we can open windows to ventilate, but what can we do in the winter?
New carpeting, furniture and pressed-wood products should be aired for 72 hours in a large, well-ventilated space before being installed, and permanent press clothing should be washed before it is worn.
Formaldehyde is used in some cosmetics, dish soaps, medicines, leather treatments and fabric softeners. Read the label before purchasing, look for certified-free products, and ventilate indoor spaces, particularly when using any product containing formaldehyde or other chemicals.
Check out the Environmental Working Group’s interactive guide for information on specific spaces, categories, and items. You can also check out LiveGreen’s cleaning page on Pinterest for natural cleaning recipes and tips.
Don’t forget the plants! Many houseplants are known to take in and store these harmful chemicals while releasing pure oxygen for you to breathe. Having plants around has been shown to lower blood pressure, reduce stress, add humidity, increase happiness, sharpen your focus and mental acuity, and help you recover from illnesses faster, just to name a few.
Here are some of the best houseplants that help clear the air of toxic chemicals:
- Peace Lily
- Warneck Dracaena
- Spider Plant
- Aloe
- Pothos
- Snake plant/Mother-in-Law’s Tongue
- ZZ plant
Most are easy to care for and survive in low-light and low-water (i.e. neglect) environments. For more information about air-cleaning houseplants, click here.
A watt of little changes adds up to big savings
Have you seen any of the new LED lights on campus? They are replacing the old fluorescent and metal halide fixtures, with dramatic results.
You have likely heard that LED bulbs save energy, and may have already converted bulbs in your house, but the same is true at the Med Center. So how much are we really saving?
First, terminology. Lightbulbs are often sold by wattage, and we’ve learned to associate that with light. e.g. 40W bulb for a lamp, 75W in the kitchen. It’s true, but it’s actually a measurement of the amount of energy you are using. A 75W bulb uses 75 watts of electricity, but puts off about 1,100 lumens of light. {Lumen, from the Latin “lūmen” meaning light/window. “Lumos” from Harry Potter makes a lot of sense now, right??}
LEDs emit lumens using substantially less watts. The light comes from small diodes so they are easily dimmable and emit less heat thereby reducing cooling costs.
Back to the savings. Lot 50, the parking garage south of the DOC, recently had all 498 fixtures converted to LEDs. The size of that garage added to the fact that it is used 24/7 meant that those lights were 8,760 hours a year.
Switching to LEDs results in an annual energy reduction of 750,601kwh. That’s enough energy to power 70 average U.S. homes! It will also save the Med Center ~$48,000 per year in electricity while reducing pollution created by burning coal…and that’s just one parking garage!
The Med Center is taking advantage of an OPPD rebate program and using the realized energy savings to purchase more LED fixtures to continue the savings.
LED project manager Brian Dykstra noted, “While those savings are impressive, it doesn’t stop there. In addition to heat-load savings, LEDs can last up to 25 times longer, we save on the maintenance costs of replacing lightbulbs. While that may sound trivial, it really add up on a campus this size.”
This is especially true when bulbs are in a vaulted ceiling like an auditorium, or always-busy spaces like the O.R. or a patient room. Greater control of the system also allows daylight harvesting and motion-sensing so lights are only on when they need to be.
LEDs will continue to be installed, based on total building use and install schedules, but you’ll be happy to know that all new buildings and remodeled spaces will have LEDs.
How Much Is Your Time Worth?
Most of us could stand to gain a few minutes back every day…there always seems to be plenty to do, and not enough time to do it.
So what if I told you there was a way to gain some of that time back, and to save money while doing it?
You can, with TravelSmart.
Wait, don’t stop reading! You may have heard of TravelSmart before and decided it’s not for you. Or maybe this is all new information. Either way, please take another 60 seconds to make sure you know the details.
If you are on the 42nd and Dewey campus and have heard of TravelSmart (here’s hoping!) you know that it provides FREE bus passes, FREE showers/locker rooms, bike racks–some of which are inside, FREE parking for carpoolers (in the same, or better, lot!), we can help you find a carpool partner from campus, and if you need it we’ll give you a FREE emergency ride home. You never have to be worried about being stranded and we can take you to your child or dependent if you want us to, and then take you both home. You can keep your parking permit and still participate, or you can turn it in to save money, your choice.
Many people participate as a way to save money, and they do. Not paying for parking, gas, vehicle maintenance, etc. really adds up! Some TravelSmarties have said it’s like getting a raise—an extra $100 not spent on commuting per month adds up to $1200 a year—and if your holiday bills are coming due now that sounds pretty good, right?
But let’s get back to time. It’s the benefit people don’t expect when they use TravelSmart. They worry that the bus route will take a few minutes longer than them driving, or that they have to meet up with a carpool partner, but don’t think about the time that is saved. You aren’t driving which means you can read, eat, relax, check emails before you get here or finish something up as you leave. You can skip the gym if you’ve biked/walked to work and back. Your commute may take a little longer than before, but you still gain time back. That can make your workday a little easier or reduce some stress at home; either way you win.
Have questions? Need help with a bus route? Email TravelSmart@unmc.edu
