Sustainability Office

President's Sustainable Campus Committee Focus Teams

Building Team

Cornell is taking steps to improve the sustainability performance of the campus buildings. Buildings are generally the largest user of energy and the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions on campuses. Buildings also use significant amounts of potable water. Cornell aims to design, build, and maintain buildings in ways that provide a safe and healthy indoor environment for inhabitants while simultaneously mitigating the building's impact on the outdoor environment.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Gilbert Delgado, Capital Projects and Planning, gd222@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Kevin Pratt, Professor, Architecture, kp238@cornell.edu

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Cornell is committed to measuring and reducing greenhouse gas emissions related to campus operations. The Cornell Climate Action Plan aims to completely eliminate net carbon emissions from campus by 2050. Annual greenhouse gas reporting will be submitted to the Presidents Climate Commitment and EPA.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Abena Sackey Ojetayo , Facilities Services, aas56@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Tim Fahey,Professor, Natural Resources, tjf5@cornell.edu
www.dnr.cornell.edu/cals/dnr/people/faculty.cfm?netId=tjf5

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Cornell is reducing energy consumption through conservation and efficiency, and switching to cleaner and renewable sources of energy such as solar, wind, geothermal, and low-impact hydropower. Implementing conservation measures and switching to renewable sources of energy can also help save money. Renewable energy generated locally and allow Cornell to support local economic development.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Ed Wilson, Sustainability Office, erw24@cornell.edu (Cornell Staff Notes interview)

Academic Representative: Jeff Tester, Professor, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, jwt54@cornell.edu
www.cbe.cornell.edu/~jwt/index.html

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Cornell is engaged in building a more sustainable food system across New York State and the region. Cornell students grow organic food on campus, and Farm Services operates a large-scale composting facility on campus. Cornell uses food purchases to support their local economies; encourage safe, environmentally-friendly farming methods; and help alleviate poverty for farmers. Additional efforts are made to lower the environmental footprint of campus dining operations such as tray-less dining, reusable mugs, and compostable packaging.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Therese O'Connor, Dining Administration, tao3@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Mike Hoffman, Professor, Entomology, mph3@cornell.edu www.entomology.cornell.edu/Faculty_Staff/Hoffmann Associate Dean and Director http://www.cuaes.cornell.edu/

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Cornell plans and maintains its land resources, green spaces, and grounds with sustainability in mind. The Cornell Master Plan provides a guide for future green development. Beautiful and welcoming campus grounds are planned, planted, and maintained while minimizing the use of toxic chemicals, protecting wildlife habitat, and conserving water and resources.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Mina Amundsen, Campus Planning Office, mma29@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Marianne Elizabeth Krasny, Professor, Natural Resources, mek2@cornell.edu

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Cornell is working to incorporate sustainability into staff, student, and faculty leadership development, human resources programs and policies, and campus community engagement. Sustainability engagement builds on the success of Cornell's long-standing commitments to diversity and fair compensation. Equipping students, faculty, and staff with the tools, knowledge, and motivation to adopt behavior changes that promote sustainability is an essential activity of a sustainable campus.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Linda Croll Howell, Workforce Diversity and Inclusion Human Resources, llc36@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Susanne M. Bruyère, Professor, School of Industrial and Labor Relations, smb23@cornell.edu

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Cornell is using its purchasing power to help build a sustainable economy in areas such as recycled paper in the library printers to energy star products. Each purchasing decision represents an opportunity to choose environmentally and socially preferable products and services and support companies with strong commitments to sustainability.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Tom Romantic, Supply Management Services, twr2@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Rohit Verma, Professor, Executive Director The Center for Hospitality Research , rv54@cornell.edu
www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/research/facultybios/faculty.html?id=179

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Cornell is working across campus and the region to move toward a more sustainable transportation systems through partnerships with Tompkins County Area Transit and Ithaca CarShare. Students created the Big Red Bikes, bike share program, to provide the campus with additional options. Bicycling and walking provide human health benefits and mitigate the need for large areas of paved surface.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Joe Lalley, Facilities Operations, jml2@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Kathryn Gleason, Professor, Architecture, klg16@cornell.edu

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Cornell is committed to reducing, reusing, recycling, and composting. Through effective campus engagement, partnerships with the municipal solid waste department, and green purchasing decisions Cornell can help mitigate the need to extract virgin materials, such as trees and metals.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Spring Buck, Recycling Operations, scb23@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Jean Bonhotal, Associate Professor, Crops and Soil Sciences,jb29@cornell.edu
cwmi.css.cornell.edu/Bonhotal.htm

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Cornell conserves water and strives to protect water quality in the regional watershed through land management, green building practices, and conservation education. Conservation and effective stormwater management are important in maintaining and protecting finite groundwater supplies. Water conservation and effective stormwater management also reduce the need for effluent discharge into local surface water supplies, which helps improve the health of local water ecosystems.
Scope and Goals
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Staff Lead: Chris Bordlemay, Department in Energy and Sustainability, clb83@cornell.edu

Academic Representative: Monroe Weber-Shirk, Senior Lecturer, Civil and Environmental Engineering and Director AguaClara, mw24@cornell.edu

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