Every year, Emory Recycles and the Office of Sustainability Initiatives hold a competition encouraging recycling efforts around campus. This contest, held throughout November, works to unite the actions of faculty, students and staff in order to demonstrate the largest comparative difference between buildings in recycling from the corresponding month of the previous year.
The Office of Sustainability Initiatives (OSI) invited Emory students, faculty and staff to submit a two-minute video that creatively and effectively educated about the importance of landfill waste diversion, including the social and environmental impacts of landfills.
When Emory crafted its current Sustainability Vision, one of the University’s most transformative — and ambitious — goals was a commitment to divert 95 percent of campus waste from municipal landfills by 2025, effectively a zero-waste policy.
The Emory Farmers Market has been a staple of the community since 2008 when it opened on the campus with its original seven vendors. The market was envisioned as part of Emory’s Sustainable Food Initiative, bringing the Emory community the opportunity to build relationships with farmers and producers who grow and make their food.
Emory University has been recognized by the City of Atlanta for its commitment to energy and water conservation through the 2016-2017 Atlanta Better Buildings Challenge.
Emory students participating in the “Don’t Dump It — Donate It” recycling program as they moved out of residence halls last month turned their used books, clothing, furniture and housewares into support for a local charitable non-profit, re:loom.
Emory’s 2025 Sustainability Vision identified four main action arenas, including utilizing Emory’s landscape, buildings, and operations to model best practices. This past year, campus departments made important strides toward realizing Emory’s Sustainability Vision goals
The Division of Animal Resources (DAR), headquartered in the Whitehead Biomedical Research Building, made strides in sustainability when they turned to recycling and composting laboratory materials and was recently recognized for its efforts.
In the summer of 2016, the Office of Sustainability Initiatives (OSI) announced the recipients of its inaugural Green Offices at Emory and Green Labs at Emory Incentives Fund programs, created to encourage students, faculty, and staff to contribute innovative ideas for achieving the goals outlined in Emory’s 2025 Sustainability Vision.
During the 2016 fiscal year, Emory successfully diverted 55 percent of waste materials from the landfill. With an almost 5 percent increase from 2015, the University is making progress toward achieving the goal of 95 percent diversion by 2025.
