university

Organic on the Green is a new blog developed by OTA to give college students interested in organics a place to network!  It features essays from students on the front lines of making college dining more sustainable and includes postings that address such diverse topics as local vs. organic, student run gardens and CSAs, and college farmers’ markets.

Exclusive interview with University of Kentucky sustainability expert Shane Tedder. Shane was just featured in the New York Times for his work at the Wildcat Wheels Bicycle Library on the UK campus. learn more about sustainability at the University of Kentucky...

Fresh from attending The Chronicle of Higher Education’s annual Executive Leadership Forum in Washington, DC. American Military University's President, Wally Boston, talks about the pros and cons of signing the Presidents Climate Commitment, from the perspective of an institute of Higher Learning.

Students at the University of California Davis Hybrid Vehicle Research Center have been creating plug-in hybrids for national competitions for some time. "Team Fate" members Jungers and Kaufman describe how they "gut" the drive train of a standard vehicle, replacing it with an electric motor, a bank of batteries, continuously variable transmission, and some smart electronics. The resulting vehicle runs on electricity, assisted by a much smaller flex-fuel internal combustion engine only when needed.

This university has a special program, called the Nelson Mandela extranet. In this program, Students go back to their communities and teach them about HIV/AIDS , bio-intensive farming, and money management.

The ethanol industry isn’t the only group up in arms about pervasive negative reporting on biofuels (see yesterday’s post: Ethanol Industry: Jobs Are Better Than Food?).

Two soybean growers’ groups have suspended $1.5 million in funding from the University of Minnesota, due to research showing that biofuels could worsen global warming.

The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) has announced the launch of its pilot rating system for sustainability in higher education. Over ninety college and university campuses will test the self-assessment tool, called STARS (Sustainability Tracking, Assessment, and Rating System). Over the course of 2008 they will provide feedback to AASHE and inform STARS version 1.0, planned for release in spring 2009.

Super Bowl XLII is going green this Sunday, using renewable energy from wind, solar and geothermal supplied by the Arizona Salt River Project.

Green dorms are being built at the University of Illinois in Champaign that use geothermal energy to provide heat and hot water to residence.

Student leader Tylor Middlestadt recounts how Empower Poly (San Luis Obispo, CA) is bringing students to the table--with staff,faculty, and local communities -- to shape a greener future. Students successfully pushed for environmentally-friendly designfor the nation's largest student housing project. Inspired by the UC Go Solar campaign, students formed Renew CSU to advocaterenewable energy projects on campuses statewide.

Researchers at the University of Minnesota describe the school's efforts to develop alternative fuels based on biomass.

JMU in Virginia is starting to train undergrads in sustainability issues

Static is not a word that describes the Sino-Italian Ecological and Energy-Efficient Building (SIEEB) at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

After three-years of competing in the “Challenge X: Crossover to Sustainable Mobility” challenge, a team from the University of Mississippi has been dubbed the victors. The competition, which is sponsored by General Motors and the U.S. Department of Energy, asked students throughout the U.S. to re-engineer a crossover sport utility vehicle that minimizes energy consumption, emissions and greenhouse gases.

Currently, there are more than 176 "green" colleges and universities, according to the U.S. Green Buildings Council, and the number continues to grow. Among them is Portland State University. Their newest engineering building has natural lighting, and natural ventilation. Rainwater is also captured on rooftops and treated on site to be used to flush toilets.