Pollution Prevention (P2) Week occurs every September and this year’s theme “Together We are One Planet” reminds us that individual actions can effect overall positive change in our environment. Are you ready to be a change-maker and move forward with plans for reducing environmental impacts at your organization?
With pollution prevention grants provided by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency, the Technical Assistance Program (TAP) at the Prairie Research Institute’s Illinois Sustainable Technology Center at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign can assist you! These grants focus on assisting manufacturers within Illinois to identify areas at the product, process, and system level to minimize waste, improve energy, and increase resource efficiency. By creating a strategy for sustainable improvement, your organization can remain competitive and profitable, while protecting the environment.
Our outreach is statewide, and each grant may focus on specific sectors, areas, or training. We hope you will take a few minutes to review these opportunities and allow us to assist you.
Assistance is fully confidential, without cost, or obligationto implement recommendations. Our technical assistance specialists will work with you every step of the way, identifying opportunities for improvement, related cost savings, and guiding you through implementation, if desired.
You can schedule your free site visit today by filling out our online request form, or connect with our technical assistance team by contacting Irene Zlevor, izlevor@illinois.edu, 217-300-8617.
Beginning in 2014, shortly after the inception of its Zero Waste Illinois program, TAP conducted its first university campus waste audit in the form of a two-phase project for U. of I., examining the types and amounts of waste generated in eight campus buildings, as well as the availability and location of waste and recycling collection bins. That study also included a survey of building occupants to gauge knowledge of current programs, gaps in service, and overall satisfaction with the campus recycling program. With this data, TAP made recommendations for waste reduction and diversion at the campus and individual building levels. The TAP zero waste team went on to conduct similar waste characterization studies for other institutes of higher learning, industrial clients, local governments, small businesses, and school districts in Illinois and beyond, as well as contributing to statewide systemic change through efforts like the Farm to Food Bank feasibility study and pilot projects. In 2019, TAP assessed indoor solid waste and recycling collection infrastructure for U. of I., leading to the initial deployment of branded three-bin collection stations for waste and recyclables in high-traffic campus locations. F&S continues to deploy those newer three-bin stations as funding permits, as part of ongoing progress toward iCAP zero waste goals.
In the fall of 2021, TAP, F&S, and other campus stakeholders began discussion of a new round of campus building waste audits. Plans were paused until after the hiring of Daphne Hulse, the first full-time U. of I. Zero Waste Coordinator, in fall 2022, to ensure the availability of dedicated staff to address waste audit results and recommendations. A spring 2023 grant from the U. of I. Student Sustainability Committee (SSC) supplemented available F&S funds to secure TAP services for waste audits of eight high-usage facilities in October 2023.
Due to the size and volume of waste and recycling generated on campus, sorting all material was not feasible. Thus, TAP and F&S used an “activity zone” approach, developed by the TAP zero waste team after their work on the previous U. of I. campus audits. This involved selecting a representative set of buildings classified according to their main functions and services. Waste audit data from those representative buildings was used to formulate recommendations for waste reduction and improving the quantity and quality of collected recyclables. Those recommendations for improvement can then be applied to other buildings that fall within the same activity zone categorization. For this waste audit, activity zones and their respective buildings included:
Academic: Business Instructional Facility (BIF) & Campus Instructional Facility (CIF)
Academic + Laboratory: Roger Adams Laboratory (RAL) & Noyes Laboratory
Multi-Activity: Illini Union & Activities & Recreation Center (ARC)
Student Living: Lincoln Avenue Residence Halls & Allen Residence Hall
TAP conducted walkthroughs of study buildings to assess current conditions and infrastructure, discuss waste and recycling challenges and successes with facility managers and other key personnel, and determine the best method for sample collection during the waste audits. The audits involved the collection of samples from trash (landfill-bound) and recycling streams from each of the selected buildings, which were then hand-sorted by TAP staff and volunteers into pre-determined categories defined in conjunction with F&S waste management staff. Following the waste audits, TAP held four focus group sessions (one per activity zone) to obtain input from campus community members (including students, faculty, and staff). Stakeholder engagement helped to gauge expectations, barriers, and sources of confusion, as well as garner suggestions for ways to reduce waste and improve collection of recyclables for the buildings included in the study. An online form was made available for submission of written feedback from those unable to attend focus group sessions and to allow session participants to submit any additional comments and suggestions.
In addition to presenting methodologies and findings, the audit report outlines current waste and recycling management practices across campus and within the examined activity zones. This includes detailed descriptions of bin liner color-coding standards and the rationale behind them, procedures at the campus Waste Transfer Station (WTS), process flow diagrams, and a list of processors and destinations for the major categories of collected recyclables. The goal was to create a document that could support F&S’s efforts to educate and engage the campus community in improved waste management and the creation of a zero-waste culture.
There are long-standing misconceptions about campus waste management practices according to Joy Scrogum, an Assistant Research Scientist with ISTC’s TAP and a member of the campus Zero Waste iCAP team. “When I was an Illinois undergraduate, I would hear people say it didn’t matter if you accidentally put recyclables in campus trash bins because everything would be sorted at the campus Waste Transfer Station. That was frankly decades ago, and I still hear people make that incorrect assertion. Although the U. of I. is an innovative research institution, our Waste Transfer Station is low-tech, with a small crew that hand sorts only a fraction of the materials collected. There’s no cutting-edge equipment using lasers or air currents to extract recyclables, just humans pulling items from certain colored bags that are emptied onto a conveyor belt. It would be physically impossible to hand sort all the waste generated on campus, and most people aren’t even aware of the fact that different colored bin liners are meant to signify different actions at the transfer station. The contents of black bags, for example, aren’t emptied for a hand sort, because that color is supposed to signify waste collected from restrooms or laboratories.”
Graphic from the audit report illustrating the campus bin liner color-coding standard.
The study uncovered a lack of awareness, confusion, and/or inconsistent compliance regarding the bin liner color-coding standard, suggesting that improved communication and efforts to ease supply chain barriers could result in increased capture of recyclable materials. Observations during building walkthroughs and feedback compiled from stakeholder engagement indicated that greater consistency in collection bin style and signage, along with improvements in communication of proper waste management and recycling procedures to students, faculty, and staff could result in improved collection and reduced contamination of recyclable materials.
Key findings from the analysis include:
34 percent of campus waste reviewed was avoidable
23 percent of all landfill materials were some form of paper towels
Recyclable materials made up 13 percent of the total waste stream
17 percent of waste was compostable
18 percent of recyclables were contaminated and therefore unsalvageable
Liquids contributed to contaminating 5 percent of all the recycling items sorted
Disposable single-use items, such as these beverage cups, are examples of potentially avoidable waste.
TAP made 39 recommendations for waste reduction and improved management grouped into seven themes (education & outreach, infrastructure, policy, programming, purchasing, research, and retail). Many of the suggestions encourage colleges and departments to look upstream at the source of waste generation to proactively reduce the amount of waste that ends up in landfills.
F&S Zero Waste Coordinator Daphne Hulse said, “ISTC’s important and updated insight gives us the ability to turn their work into meaningful results that have an impact across campus. To accomplish our goals, we need to keep looking at how we can all continue to make progress by taking all available actions to properly reduce, reuse, and recycle where we study, work, recreate, and live.”
Daphne Hulse will also discuss the audit results, the details of campus waste and recycling management, and ongoing zero waste initiatives in an ISTC Sustainability Seminar presentation entitled, “Landfills Are Organized Littering: How the University of Illinois Is Moving Toward Zero Waste.” This hybrid presentation (with in-person and online attendance options), is scheduled for September 11 from 2-3 PM. Learn more and register at https://calendars.illinois.edu/detail/6229/33493027. ISTC Sustainability Seminars are recorded with archives available online within a few weeks of the seminar’s completion.
Part of the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center’s Technical Assistance Program (TAP), the Institutional Water Treatment program, or IWT, provides unbiased, professional water treatment advice to facilities equipped with institutional water systems such as cooling towers, chillers, boilers, etc. IWT services support public health and safety while also facilitating cost savings associated with chemicals, energy, water, and maintenance in industrial and potable water systems. Services range from presenting on-site training and seminars to providing chemical specifications and making recommendations concerning a comprehensive water treatment program for the control of corrosion, mineral scale formation, and biological growth.
Recently, IWT has added to its list of valuable services by offering testing for Legionella pneumophila, the bacterium that causes Legionnaires’ disease–a potentially fatal type of pneumonia (lung infection). L. pneumophila also causes Pontiac fever, a less serious, flu-like illness. This bacterium can grow in building water systems, such as showerheads, sink faucets, cooling towers, ice machines, spa pools, evaporative condensers, hot water systems, and complex plumbing systems. People become infected by inhaling tiny water droplets containing bacteria, or by aspirating contaminated drinking water (accidentally inhaling water into the lungs or windpipe when drinking).
Legionnaires’ disease and L. pneumophila derive their names from a 1976 outbreak of pneumonia that occurred among attendees of an American Legion convention at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel in Philadelphia, PA. There were a total of 182 reported cases, with 29 deaths, among the 2000 attendees. The cause of the outbreak was eventually determined to be a previously unknown bacterium, L. pneumophila, which had bred within the cooling tower of the hotel’s air conditioning system and subsequently spread throughout the building, infecting the Legionnaires. Once this bacterium had been isolated, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) were able to retroactively attribute earlier outbreaks of disease to it, including earlier cases of Legionnaires’ and an outbreak of a flu-like illness at a health department in Pontiac, MI which became known as Pontiac fever.
According to the CDC, health departments reported nearly 10,000 cases of Legionnaires’ disease in the United States in 2018; however, Legionnaires’ disease is likely underdiagnosed, so this may underestimate the true incidence. Since no vaccines exist to prevent Legionnaires’ disease, the key to prevention is proper maintenance of building water systems to reduce the risk of growth and spread of bacteria. Regular maintenance testing of large distribution water systems provides validation that the water management program is effectively preventing the growth of L. pneumophila. Testing is also performed during outbreak investigations to identify the source of bacteria where reported cases of Legionnaires’ disease have been confirmed.
IWT offers on-site water sample collection and two laboratory test methods for L. pneumophila detection. The IWT laboratory is one of only six laboratories in Illinois that is CDC ELITE Certified for Legionella testing. The CDC Environmental Legionella Isolation Techniques Evaluation (ELITE) is a yearly program where laboratories demonstrate their proficiency in successfully identifying Legionella in water samples.
On January 22, 2019, in response to a United Nations International Panel on Climate Change report, which demonstrated that the consequences of man-made climate change will become irreversible in 12 years if global carbon emissions are not immediately and dramatically reduced, the Forest Preserves of Cook County Board of Commissioners unanimously adopted a Net Zero Resolution. This resolution revised the 80% GHG emissions reduction goal to net-zero by 2050, as well as reducing facility GHG emissions by 45% by 2030 and committing to the development of a renewable energy plan.
TAP is currently working with the Forest Preserves on updating their Sustainability & Climate Resiliency Plan accordingly, while simultaneously assisting with the implementation of previously identified objectives and strategies to achieve their ambitious GHG reduction goals.
The most recent result of this collaboration is the development of a Clean Energy Framework, modeled after the Cook County Energy Plan. The Forest Preserves of Cook County Clean Energy Framework documents existing conditions through a needs assessment and review of current initiatives. Further, it prioritizes renewable energy technologies and strategies which the Forest Preserves might employ and creates a roadmap to achieving the Forest Preserves’ 2030 and 2050 goals. A Net Zero Emissions implementation schedule is presented, and the relationships between the Clean Energy Framework objectives and the objectives of the broader Sustainability & Climate Resiliency Plan are outlined.
Within the Framework it is noted that to actualize the goals and strategies outlined, energy conservation and efficiency of the many existing facilities must be prioritized and continuously pursued to reduce the existing operational footprint of the Forest Preserves. On a parallel course, the concept of green building must be thoroughly explored, redefined, and codified to embody building operations, ecosystem services, and renewable energy generation, fully encompassing the Preserves’ values of environmental stewardship and fostering human well-being in any building upgrade or new building project. Simultaneously, the Forest Preserves must aggressively pursue vetting, selecting and ongoing implementation of on-site renewable energy systems, coupled with collaborative pursuit, in partnership with Cook County, of a large-scale renewable energy installation, and sourcing of RECs to account for any emissions balances.
Principal authors of the Framework include Anthony D. Tindall, Policy & Sustainability Manager of the Forest Preserves of Cook County, along with April Janssen Mahajan, Joy Scrogum, Savannah Feher, and Shantanu Pai of TAP. Jennifer Martin of TAP was also among the advisors for the report.
The Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC) Technical Assistance Program (TAP) has a new web presence. You may now find information on TAP at https://go.illinois.edu/techassist.
TAP makes companies and communities more competitive and resilient with sustainable business practices, technologies, and solutions. TAP works at the intersection of industry, science, and government to help organizations achieve profitable, sustainable results.
The new website makes it easier to find information on TAP programs, services, and projects. Visitors can sign up for free site visits or learn about fee-for-service opportunities to engage our sustainability experts. Any Illinois organization, business, manufacturing facility, institute of higher learning, government entity, public utility, or institution may request one free site visit (per location) at no cost to the facility.
General inquiries may be addressed to istc-info@illinois.edu. You may also reach out to specific TAP team members for assistance in their areas of expertise.
by Jeremy Overmann, Chemist & Water Treatment Specialist ISTC Institutional Water Treatment services group
The domestic plumbing systems in any building or part of a building that has been shut down or has experienced reduced use due to COVID-19 policies are at risk for causing disease and death due to the effects of increased water age, including corrosion and growth of bacteria. Before re-opening any such building, take steps to minimize these risks and include consultation with a licensed plumber.
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) has a general guidance document for returning these systems to regular use. In Attachment B (Section II, Step 2. b), IDPH recommends setting the water heater to at least 120 degrees F prior to flushing the domestic hot water plumbing.
We recommend a higher temperature of at least 142 degrees F as this will kill Legionella bacteria in the heater within 30 minutes. However, do not use water at this temperature for flushing if the building’s drain waste vent (DWV) materials and/or plumbing system components cannot handle this higher temperature.
WARNING: 142 degree F water can cause third degree burns in seconds. Note that Legionella bacteria can continue to grow at temperatures up to 122 degrees F.
The Environmental Science Policy and Research Institute has written a useful guidance document, Reducing Risk to Staff Flushing Buildings, which offers best practices for flushing building water systems in a way that keeps facility staff safe.
Use the IDPH guidance in conjunction with your facility’s Legionella Water Management Program (WMP). If none exists, we recommend writing a remediation and/or recommissioning plan, then later developing a full WMP. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) offers a free training program on how to write a WMP and a toolkit to assist in developing a WMP.
Additional recommendations
Drinking Fountains: If these were shut off and/or not used for a period of time, they should be cleaned according to the manufacturer’s instructions before being used again for drinking.
Chlorine levels: The Illinois EPA requires a minimum of 0.5 parts per million Free Chlorine or 1.0 parts per million Total chlorine (also called Combined chlorine) in drinking water, unless a facility has been given an exemption (this is rare, but applies in some cases to facilities supplied with clean well water).
After re-opening, we recommend maintaining 142 degrees F or higher in all domestic water heaters and storage tanks, and 124 degrees F or higher in all recirculating domestic hot water systems for the purpose of reducing the risk of Legionnaire’s Disease. Note that delivered water at fixtures must meet local and state plumbing codes for maximum safe temperature to prevent scalding. The best way to achieve Legionella risk reduction and anti-scalding is to maintain high temperature in tanks and recirculating systems and employ thermostatic mixing valves just prior to point of use fixtures.
Finally, we recommend documenting all actions you take to prepare facilities for re-opening.
About the Institutional Water Treatment services group
The Institutional Water Treatment (IWT) services group, a unit of the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center at the University of Illinois, provides unbiased, professional water treatment advice to facilities equipped with industrial water systems including cooling towers, chillers, boilers, etc. If you need assistance with addressing system start-up due to COVID-19 or other related services, including legionella monitoring, please contact Jeremy Overmann or Mike Springman.
