When a campus building will be demolished, there are often materials which can be salvaged rather than recycled or landfilled.  There are opportunities to salvage these materials through Requests for Proposals, as was done with the Cruze Farm Barn, or through agreements with community organizations such as PACA.  In the past, PACA was able to salvage materials from campus buildings before the demolitions took place, and they are interested in reinstating this practice.

There are various education grants available to the University, and many are received every year.  The choice to seek grant funding for sustainability related educational programs is reflected in the project history for this project.

The Center for a Sustainable Environment (CSE), formerly the Office of Sustainability (OS), funded a faculty member who is developing long-term experiential learning sites that will integrate research, education, engagement, and operations through hands-on learning on campus, regionally, and globally.  This includes development of virtual experiential learning sites, which archive data and information on the physical sites.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is commited to moving beyond coal. Reducing our carbon footprint has been the overarching goal since we signed the American Colleges and Universities Presidents' Climate Commitment (ACUPCC).  Completing the Climate Action Plan (iCAP) for campus was a major step forward.

Make campus purchasing entities (all units and departments with purchasing privileges) responsible for costs of the disposal of the products consumed

Use carbon and other environmental indicators for purchasing to avoid environmentally irresponsible products and corporations. Coordinate this effort with other universities.  These indicators should be incorporated into the campus sustainable purchasing policies.

One of the long-term energy commitments set forth in the 2010 Illinois Climate Action Plan was to impose charges for the purchase of renewable energy for facilities that use massive amounts of energy. The National Petascale Computing Facility is the only current facility that falls into this catagory. The National Science Foundation (NSF) funds the energy use of the facility. The University plans to impost charges on the NSF for the cost of renewable energy in the next contract negotiations.  

One of the strategies discussed in the 2010 Illinois Climate Action Plan, within the Agriculture theme, was to incorporate carbon costs into food products sold on campus. Incorporating carbon costs into food prices would incentivize the use of local or more sustainable products. This would help the University reach its target of reducing directly related agricultural emissions by 50 percent by 2020.

All of the iCAP projects will need resources in order to implement them.  This project is about identifying the necessary resources for each of the iCAP objectives.

The Facilities & Services Operations, Maintenance, and Alterations division could allocate base budget funding directly to sustainability projects.