Category: Reuse

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Zero is the Favorite Number for Waste Fighter

Bartels
Bart Bartels calls the shots at the Fighting Illini’s Zero Waste football game during Homecoming.

ISTC’s Bart Bartels has joined the Purchasing, Waste, and Recycling  SWATeam at the U of I. It is one of six SWATeams (Sustainability Working Advisory Teams) helping evaluate the university’s progress since the 2010 Illinois Climate Action Plan (iCAP). Their work will be important for the formulation of the next iCAP later this year.

 

As Sustainability Outreach Specialist at ISTC, Bart has helped organize zero-waste events on campus. The next one will be the Naturally Illinois EXPO  (with something for all K-12 students) sponsored by the Prairie Research Institute. Bart also is the driving force behind the Illinois Green Office Challenge.

 

He has also worked as Zero Waste Coordinator within campus Facilities & Services and Campus Sustainability Manager at Grand Valley State University (MI). The SWATeams will be important to the successful updating of the iCAP this year by the Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment.

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Sustainability Series Explores Recent Trends in Reuse and Recycling

30yearISTC-Seminar-Spring

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ISTC’s Spring Sustainability Series, commemorating the Center’s 30th anniversary year, deals with new developments in the original green practice, practiced for thousands of years, recycling.

 

The series opens at noon, Thursday, Feb. 12 and continues for four more Thursday noon hours through the semester. The live presentations will take place at 1 E. Hazelwood Dr. in Champaign, IL. Each will also be available by webcast at the listed websites.

 

Feb. 12, “How Sustainable is Information Technology? Trends, Challenges, and Opportunities,” Eric Masanet, Morris E. Fine Junior Professor in Materials and Manufacturing and Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Chemical and Biological Engineering, McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science, Northwestern University. https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/7017258394988082434

 

March 12, “Building a Local Circular Economy in Chicago,” John Mulrow – Interim Executive Director, Plant Chicago. https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3276792405148335106

 

April 2, “Bioprocessing of Microbial Biomass: Enabling Sustainable Zero-Discharge Seafood Production,” David E. Brune, Professor of Bioprocess and Bioenergy Engineering, Division of Food Sciences and Bioengineering, University of Missouri at Columbia. https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/502302355428424705

 

April 9, “Rubbery Shrubbery: Should We Use Rubber Mulch in Our Landscapes?” Linda Chalker-Scott, Extension Horticulturist, Puyallup Research and Extension Center, Washington State University. https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3502265956143542273

 

April 30, “Zero Waste Illinois,” Shantanu Pai, Waste Research Specialist, Illinois Sustainable Technology Center. https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/7792068845789351938

 

Following each event, the recorded presentation will be available at http://www.istc.illinois.edu/about/sustainability_seminars.cfm. For more information about the individual seminars, visit http://www.istc.illinois.edu/calendar/.

 

 

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Businesses in Central Illinois Taking Up Green Challenge

GOCbuildingThe Illinois Green Office Challenge is picking up steam in it’s goal to green-up Central Illinois businesses.

 

CBS affiliate WYZZ Channel 31 last night reported on The Ecology Action Center’s partnership with the U of I’s Illinois Sustainable Technology Center to help Illinois businesses and organizations save money buy cutting utility bills and waste.

 

The Challenge provides ideas to help businesses compete to get recognition for their successes in sustainable business. This year the competition is focusing on organizations in and around Peoria, Bloomington-Normal, and Champaign-Urbana.

 

Other partners in the Challenge include the University of Illinois Extension, Economic Development Council for Central Illinois and the City of Urbana.

 

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9 Ways to have a Waste Free Holiday

  1. Reduce the quantity of food served. Holiday season means fun andfood with friends and family.  We all want to impress our guest with a lavish display of food but then we are left with the dreaded left overs. Don’t get me wrong…I love the cold turkey sandwich with the cranberry sauce the next day but after a week of left overs, I think, “Why did I make it all?”  So I challenge everyone to make less this holiday.  If you just can’t resist making all that food, consider finding a soup kitchen to donate all the left overs. (For more reading see this article: Reducing Food Waste During the Holiday Season)

    using old news papers, comics, and maps as wrapping paper instead of traditional wrapping paper
    News paper and map wrapped presents
  2. Consider locally sourced food. Plants are CO2 negative but you might be surprised just how much CO2 was emitted to get the holiday mashed potatoes on the table (For more information see True Cost of a Holiday Dinner).
  3. Give the gift that keeps on giving: Alternative gifts such as planting a tree in someone’s name (American Forests or Arbor Day Foundation) can be a lovely way to say you care about the special someone without bogging them down with more stuff. Or consider making a donation in their name to a charity that does work they value.
  4. If you still want to give a gift, consider giving the gift of curiosity and creativity. Think about what inspires your kids, your loved ones or your loved one’s kids to indulge their curiosity about art, the natural world, or how to create something innovative. Or give the gift of an experience, like a trip to a nearby city or a gift certificate for a new activity.
  5. Use greener alternatives to traditional wrapping paper
  6. Make eco-friendly decorations from used shipping boxes or consider getting a potted tree to plant after the holidays

    cell phone lights LEDs instead of a candle lit menorah
    Cell phone menorah for Hanukkak
  7. Consider Eco-Smart Holiday Greeting Choices – this article says it all!
  8. Traveling? Consider off setting your carbon emissions and remember to lower the thermostat at home or in the office.
  9. Spring isn’t the only season for cleaning. Because most of us feel “stuck inside” during the cold months, winter can be the perfect time to purge the house of unneeded or unwanted items. Don’t just throw them out.  Think of ways to donate, reuse, or recycle those items.

 

Additional Resources

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Events Promote Sustainability Awareness at Home and Far-Far Away

PlasticParadiseDirector, writer and actress Angela Sun will visit the Urbana-Champaign campus at 6 p.m. on Tues., Oct. 21 for a screening of her film “Plastic Paradise: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.”

The documentary records the plight of the natural ecosystem of Midway Atoll as it encounters the Great Pacific Gyre, a swirling garbage patch of plastic washed off of surrounding continents.

Named a National Wildlife Refuge in 1988, Midway’s reefs and sand islands form a habitat for millions of seabirds. The film traces Sun’s investigation of the damage produced by humans’ demand for plastic.

The event will be held in Room 149, National Soybean Research Center.

Co-sponsors for this free community/campus event are the Institute for Sustainablity, Energy, and the Environment (iSEE), and the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center.

Plastics in the environment have increasingly raised concerns from researchers, activists and policy makers. California-based Surfrider Foundation has named October “Rise Above Plastics” month, during which they promote consumer awareness against the tsunami of plastic in the human economy. A phenomenon of the second half of the 20th century, plastic production has supplanted the use of natural materials with the benefits of being light and strong. But those very properties mean they degrade very slowly and have alarmed many scientists for their increasing presence in the marine food chain. ISTC has several projects looking at the reuse and recycling of plastics to keep more of them out of landfills or the environment. Click here for a recent report on plastic to oil research at ISTC.

Sun’s visit is also an appropriate warm-up to “Campus Sustainability Day” recognized on the U of I campus and nationally the next day, Oct. 22. Between 1-4 p.m. in Illini Union Room 314B on Oct. 22, iSEE will sponsor a progress report of the university’s Illinois Climate Action Plan (iCAP). In 2010, U of I became a leader among U.S. universities by announcing ambitious climate goals, including carbon neutrality by 2050. Register here for the iCAP update.

Working teams developing revisions to the 2010 iCAP will review the campus’ progress on the plan and accept public comment on a proposed 2015 iCAP update.

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Kids Invited to ‘Reuse and Rediscover’ at Ill. State Museum

Families with children aged 3-10 will find a fun day of art and science at the Illinois State Museum in Springfield. “Reuse and Rediscover” is a free event from 11 a.m.- 3 p.m. Saturday, April 26. Everyday items that clog our garbage cans will be repurposed as a bottle cap art mural. Packing peanuts will be studied for their eco-friendliness. A Recycle Relay will help children understand what other items are recyclable or not.   The Illinois State Museum is at 502 S. Spring Street, Springfield, IL 62706. Free parking!

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Three Tips on the Road to a Great Governor’s Award Application

TrophyPath2If your organization has done a lot in the name of sustainability – from projects that save money and resources to initiatives that strengthen the people and communities you work for – what are you waiting for? The Governor’s Sustainability Award provides a great opportunity for you to pull all of your sustainability work together into a single document: Your award application!

 

Because sustainability encompasses the triple bottom line – People, Planet, Profit – it can be tough to wrap one’s brain around all that should be included in your application. Our How To Apply page and FAQ’s will help you in that process, but we know that’s a lot to read! Here are three tips to help you cut to the chase, and get started on your application (due May 22).

 

1. Start driving. Get key people on board.

Governor’s Award Applications are typically a team effort, but there is often a single person or small team that drives the process forward. The application drivers can be anyone – from top management to employees who volunteer time on a Green Team. If you’re reading this, you may be the driver!

 

Send a note out to co-workers letting them know you’re preparing a Gov.’s Award application. Here are some key people to get on board early (positions vary by organization):

  • Top Management
  • Facilities/Operations Manager
  • Plant Manager
  • Sustainability Officer/Green Team Lead
  • PR Officer

 

2. Read these two things.

Narrative Guidelines –You have up to six single-spaced pages to describe your sustainability accomplishments. These guidelines tell you how.

 

Metrics Form Instructions – Download the Metrics Form (Microsoft Excel format) and read the Instructions tab.

 

3. Check out the sample applications.

The sample applications, available HERE, display best practices from past winners’ applications. Note that a good application typically includes a variety of projects touching on multiple impacts or aspects of sustainability. The project descriptions will also include some detail on how they were conceived and who was involved. We want to hear how your organization went from idea to implementation.

 

 

BONUS TIP: Consider normalizing your data.

Normalized data is reported on a relevant per-unit basis. One of our 2013 award winners, Champaign-Urbana Mass Transit District, tracked their water use in this way before and after implementing water conservation measures in their wash bay. Instead of simply reporting total gallons of water consumed, they reported gallons per vehicle-hour, providing us with a water-use measure that can be compared across years, regardless of how many trips the buses make.  This type of measurement, a normalized metric, is extremely helpful for evaluating your progress – the true impact of a sustainability project.

 

Check out the Illinois Manufacturer Inc. sample application for more normalization examples and talk to your team about what per-unit measures you might use in your application.

 

If you still have questions about the process, contact John Mulrow for more information via e-mail at jmulrow@illinois.edu or call him at 630.586.9168.

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ISTC Supercapacitor Research Gets Most Online Buzz

“Highly ordered macroporous woody biochar with ultra-high carbon content as supercapacitor electrodes” by ISTC researchers Junhua Jiang, Lei Zhang, Xinying Wang, Nancy Holm, Kishore Rajagopalan, and colleagues at the University of South Carolina had the highest altmetric scores from altmetric.com for the Electrochimica Acta for the past six months. This is particularly noteworthy since the articles was published online in November.

 

The article by lead author, Senior Researcher Jiang, received an altmetric score of 43 for the period. The next most popular article received a score of eight.

 

The Illinois Hazardous Waste Research Fund and the HeteroFoaM Center (an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Basic Research) supported this study.

 

For more on biochar supercapacitors, visit http://www.dailyillini.com/news/campus/article_5d819c9c-45b8-11e3-8549-001a4bcf6878.html

 

 

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Wood Biochar Offers Promise of Cheap Supercapacitors

ISTC is investigating wood-biochar’s use as a supercapacitor. The material offers equal power capabilities as activated carbon, but is much less expensive.

 

A team led by Senior Engineer Junhua Jiang published results in the journal Electrocimica Acta, demonstrating the natural microstructures of biochars can be provide effective surface area for electrodes. Currently supercapactitors are often manufactured with corrosive chemicals that create elaborate structures of out of activated carbon.

 

Such procedures are far more expensive and can have environmental consequences.
Supercapacitors are super because they have far greater surface area electrodes than regular capacitors, allowing the rapid collection and release of ions. Cousins of electrochemical batteries, supercapacitors do not yet store as much energy, but they can release energy very quickly, recharge quickly and have high cycling stability. In other words, supercapacitors permit much faster discharge and recharge cycles than a battery is capable of, as well as tolerance of a larger number of discharge/charge cycles.

 

The Illinois Hazardous Waste Research Fund and the HeteroFoaM Center (an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Basic Research) supported this study.

 

For more on biochar supercapacitors, visit http://www.dailyillini.com/news/campus/article_5d819c9c-45b8-11e3-8549-001a4bcf6878.html