University of Washington, Seattle
PA-2: Sustainability Planning

Sustainability Action Plan Target: Double Sustainability-Oriented Research Projects by 2025
Sustainability evolves at the intersection between society and the environment. Much of scientific research is aligned along with this same interface, so more refined attention to sustainability illuminates our thinking about how we engage in research. We start toward this Target simply by understanding these parallels through a comprehensive sustainability research inventory. We will also vigorously expand our work beyond the walls of academia, making our campuses and surrounding communities living laboratories that provide rich collaborations and shared positive outcomes.

Sustainability Action Plan Target: One UW-Wide Sustainability Framework by 2022
A clear, common definition of sustainability is necessary for effective communication and coordination around learning and action across campus. This Target invokes a campuswide definition and standardized reporting of existing sustainability courses. To successfully facilitate this goal and others, an Academic Sustainability Manager will be hired. The 2021 Action Plan will also lay foundations for the development of a UW-wide sustainability course or other general requirements, and begin work toward a common, minimum sustainability learning outcome by 2025.

UW Sustainability Action Plan: green.uw.edu/plan

Sustainability Action Plan Target: Double Student, Staff, and Faculty Sustainability Engagement by 20204

This Target is about increasing the visibility of, and access to, sustainability in campus life. Implementing actions include a wide range of education programs, collaborations, and volunteerism that touch the lives of nearly every student, staff, and faculty member, as well as community members in the neighborhoods surrounding UW campuses. The 2021 Action Plan will include actions that promote innovative collaborations between UW’s existing healthy living and environmental sustainability efforts; expanded professional development; and community engagement programs.

UW Sustainability Action Plan: green.uw.edu/plan

Sustainability Action Plan Target: 15% Lower Energy Usage Intensity by 2025
80% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions come from combusting fossil fuels to generate energy, including electricity. We need to do our part toward reducing energy consumption. Achieving this goal will require accelerating the implementation of energy conservation projects, targeting older and less efficient buildings for deep retrofits, and ensuring all new buildings meet the UW Green Building Standard to minimize water and energy consumption. The expanded use of utility metering and monitoring-based commissioning will keep buildings operating optimally.

Sustainability Action Plan Target: 10% Less Solid Waste by 2025
Everything we throw away is something that we don’t need. That may seem self-evident, but combined with lifecycle thinking it means an opportunity to reduce manufacturing emissions, energy consumption, transportation, and even raw materials extraction associated with whatever object we didn’t need. “Reduce, reuse, recycle” remains a powerful hierarchy of solid waste management, but there are even more details of product and materials management, economics, and urban ecology that can receive both our research attention and our operational attention.

Sustainability Action Plan Target: 45% Reduction of Greenhouse Gas Emissions by 2030
Climate change is the environmental issue of our time. The UW is a worldclass research center in climate-related topics; in fact climate change’s centrality to our academic life is reflected in a Guiding Principle of this Sustainability Strategy. We’re going to follow through on our sustainability commitment by embarking on a major energy planning process to drastically reduce the Seattle Campus district heating system’s demand for fossil fuels, and reduce our dependence on utility energy with solar photovoltaic power on all our campuses.

UW Sustainability Action Plan: green.uw.edu/plan

The UW Diversity Blueprint for 2017-2021 is organized around these six goals:
1) Cultivate an inclusive campus climate;
2) Attract, retain, and graduate a diverse and excellent student body;
3) Attract and retain a diverse faculty;
4) Attract and retain a diverse staff;
5) Assess tri-campus diversity needs; and
6) Improve accountability and transparency.

https://www.washington.edu/diversity/diversity-blueprint/

Sustainability Action Plan Target: Comprehensive Equitable Purchasing Targets by 2022
Procurement comprises a significant portion of UW’s spending. With its purchasing decisions UW can endorse suppliers who are practicing sustainability; we aspire to have 100% of them aligned with our Supplier Code of Conduct. We are quickly working to incorporate students’ voices in purchasing decisions. As we work with campus units and departments to develop equitable purchasing targets, we will follow the state’s goals for minority- women- and veteran-owned businesses under the Results Washington strategic framework.

UW Sustainability Action Plan: green.uw.edu/plan

UW Executive Order Number 13, Environmental Stewardship and Sustainability, was approved by President Michael Young on August 30, 2012, and has been reviewed by the Faculty Senate, Board of Deans, the Environmental Stewardship Committee and the policy sub-teams. The Order, an umbrella statement confirming the UW’s longstanding commitment to sustainability, will serve as a guiding principle for future sustainability policy development.
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/PO/EO13.html


The UW Board of Regents has published position statements on several topics related to sustainability. These include a policy on the university's role and mission to serve the community, state, region, nation and world, as well as serving traditional and non-traditional students; a policy on the economic sustainability of the university, a policy on transportation, a policy on diversity, a policy on ethical principles (including topics such as conflict of interest and waste of university resources), a policy on business equity (purchasing goods and services from diverse vendors), and a policy on divestment (created and applied in 2017 in association to divestment from coal companies). Links to policies are provided below.

Regent Policy No. 5 - Role and Mission of the University
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/BRG/RP5.html

Regent Policy No. 7 Transportation Policy
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/BRG/RP7.html

Regent Policy No. 11 - Statement on Diversity
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/BRG/RP11.html

Regent Policy No. 14 - Statement of Ethical Principles
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/BRG/RP14.html

Regent Policy No. 15 - Declaration of Concern for the Sustainability of Washington Public Higher Education:
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/BRG/RP15.html

Regent Policy No. 16 - Statement of Business Equity for the University of Washington
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/BRG/RP16.html

Regent Policy No. 17 - University of Washington Divestment Guideline
http://www.washington.edu/admin/rules/policies/BRG/RP17.html

UW signed on to ACUPCC in 2008.

UW signed on to the Washington Business Climate Declaration in 2015.
https://green.uw.edu/news/uw-signs-washington-business-climate-declaration

In 2018, UW signed the Declaration on University Global Engagement, a joint effort from the United Nations Institute for Training Research and the Association of Public & Land-grant Universities. This effort further aligns the work of the world’s top universities with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
http://globallyengageduniversities.org/

In 2018, the UW joined 12 other leading North American research universities in the new University Climate Change Coalition, or UC3, a group committed to leveraging its research and resources to help communities accelerate climate action.
https://secondnature.org/initiative/uc3-coalition/