The Student News Site of San Francisco State University

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The Student News Site of San Francisco State University

Golden Gate Xpress

The Student News Site of San Francisco State University

Golden Gate Xpress

SF State recognized by Princeton Review for being green

SF State also jumped up 40 spots from last year to number 29 on the Sierra Club’s 100 Coolest Schools list, which examines energy efficiency, alternative transportation and waste management.

Ayesha Rashid, a 21-year-old senior and anthropology major at SF State, was not surprised by the school’s high rating for sustainability.

“Our campus has not only a recycling bin but a landfill and compost bins as well,” Rashid said. “The campus has gone out of its way to make sure students learn where to throw what based on the instructions printed on the bins.”

SF States tries to make environmental sustainability accessible to every student and faculty member but it is also something to implement on a larger scale as well.

In May 2007, SF State President Robert A. Corrigan made it an initiative to reduce the campus’s green house gas emissions when he signed the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment.

This initiative was needed because from 1990 to 2006 SF State’s overall greenhouse gas emissions rose by 47 percent, according to an inventory that focused on the school’s impact on the environment.

The report also found that the school was emitting 61,184 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents that year, which equals the amount of CO2 emissions from the energy use of 5,307 homes in one year according to the Environmental Protection Agency’s greenhouse gas equivalencies calculator.

Caitlin Steele, campus sustainability programs manager at SF State, did research for and co-wrote the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory, one of the first steps in the commitment signed by the president.

“SF State supports over 21,000 people every day,” Steele said. “My goal is to lessen the impact that we have on our campus and our surrounding ecology.”

The Climate Action Plan was the next step in the SF State’s commitment to become more sustainable. It was prepared by more than 30 faculty, staff, administrators and students in 2010.

The plan states that its goals are to reduce the campus’s greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by 2020. Steele said that the emissions are already down 7 percent since 1990.

Currently the school is working with SF Environment to put compost bins everywhere on campus including University Park North, and placing the three bin system with recycling, trash and compost all over campus.

 

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SF State recognized by Princeton Review for being green