February 28, 2002-Vol33n19: Q&A

VOLUME 33, NUMBER 19

THURSDAY, February 28, 2002


	SIMPSON

Walter Simpson is campus energy officer and director of the UB Green Office

What is the UB Green Office?
UB Green is part of University Facilities. We support campus environmental stewardship by promoting energy conservation, recycling, green building design, waste reduction and green purchasing. We have an office and environmental library at 220 Winspear Ave. on the South Campus. In addition to myself, our staff consists of environmental educator Erin Cala and student assistants Alicia Cerretani, Sam Chiang, Jessica Harden, and Ashish Joshi. It's a great place to work!

Describe the "Think Green" campaign.
"Think Green" is our current campus environmental-awareness program. We ask all members of the university community to be mindful of our beautiful natural world as they go about their campus business. "Think Green" suggests simple actions every faculty and staff member, and student can take to reduce his or her environmental impact. The campaign also has the support of offices and departments on campus. For example, when we started the campaign, Computing and Information Technology and University Libraries switched all their printers to Envirographic-100, which is 100 percent post-consumer process chlorine-free recycled paper. That decision is saving a forest of trees and preventing dioxin air and water pollution every day. We encourage all offices and departments to use this environmentally superior paper.

UB is recognized as a leader in the green-campus movement. What are some of the university's "environmental achievements?"
Our energy-conservation program is among the best in the country. Thanks to a longstanding team effort, UB has achieved documented energy savings of more than $60 million since the program's inception more than 20 years ago. The interesting thing is that even after so much has been done, I can still walk the campus and see lots of opportunity for energy conservation and efficiency improvement. We are in the process of starting another large energy-conservation retrofit project—this one focused on the South Campus. Needless to say, I welcomed Gov. Pataki's recent executive order requiring all state agencies to become more energy efficient and use environmentally responsible, green-design principles for all new construction. We also can be proud of our campus recycling program, our excellent environmental policies and the work of our Environmental Task Force. Through our Web site, the UB Green Office encourages campus involvement and shares the university's green-campus accomplishments and resources, nationally and internationally. Check it out at http://wings.buffalo.edu/ubgreen.

Tell me about the campus recycling program. How much of our solid waste do we now recycle?
Our recycling program has been improving steadily and we now recycle more than 35 percent of the campus solid-waste stream. Our goal is at least 50 percent. University Facilities, Residence Halls and Apartments, and FSA each have their own recycling program. Recently, Facilities installed more than 100 public-area recycling stations, making it easier to recycle plastic, glass and metal beverage containers, as well as paper. UB now recycles computers and even diskettes and CD-ROMs.

What is the one environmentally unfriendly thing people do that irks you the most?
I try to keep a sense of humor about all the things that irk me! One thing on my list is the failure of most members of the campus community to enable the power-management features on their computers and monitors—so they go into a low-power "sleep mode" when not actively in use. The instructions for enabling these features are on our Web site. If everyone did it, we probably could save $400,000 a year.

Do you practice what you preach at home?
I try to "walk the walk" as best I can. We live in a passive solar home in Amherst, which appealed to us because it was half-way between the campuses, minimizing commuting. It has 240 square feet of south-facing windows. Sunlight fills our house, keeping the electric lights off during the day and, in the winter, meeting one third of our heating needs. When we moved in 10 years ago, we tore the whole house apart, and, abandoning any sense of reasonable payback, super-insulated it so that the walls are R-30 and the ceilings are R-50. Our worst monthly winter natural gas bill is less than $100. We have two small cars that get 40 miles per gallon. We try to shop less and buy used when we can, and we buy organic produce though a community-supported agriculture program. We recently installed a solar hot-water system. My children and I tease each other about turning out the lights—though nearly every bulb in our house is compact fluorescent. Our electric bill is less than a third of the Western New York average. Also, my wife, Nan, and I have been vegetarians for 20 years. Our two kids are happy vegetarians, too. It's a diet that is kind to your health, animals and the environment. Oh, I almost forgot—we recycle too!

What question do you wish I had asked, and how would you have answered it?
I wish you had asked me about global warming, a problem we are in national denial about. There is a near-consensus among scientists that global-climate change, fueled by our addiction to, and over-consumption of, fossil fuels, has begun and could raise average global temperatures by as much as 10 degrees this century. That would be unprecedented and catastrophic. This Earth is a wonderful place. We have no right to trash it or ruin the lives of future generations.