UBC leader in campus sustainability

The Sheaf
Written by Crystal Clarke
Thursday, 25 November 2004
Freda Pagani, the University of British Columbia’s Director of Campus Sustainability, visited Saskatoon last week. Pagani has been with the project since its inception, after completing her PhD in architecture and was involved in the building of the C.K. Choi Building, an award-winning demonstration green building. On Wednesday, November 17, she gave a talk to students about the innovations that UBC has undergone in order to make it the world’s leader in sustainable campuses and a goal for Canadian universities to strive towards, including the U of S. Her talk was held together by one theme: the unexpected success of the UBC program and its unexpected outcomes.

UBC’s Campus Sustainability Office opened in 1998, one year after implementing a sustainable development policy. The policy was implemented in UBC’s 300 different departments where volunteer sustainability coordinators work on enforcing the policy by providing tools to the department to make sustainability easier and more accessible. This was an unexpected inspiration for Pagani, as the meeting of the staff from around the campus came together and worked together to make the project possible.

The C. K. Choi Building for the Institute of Asian Research has brought much attention to the project and the UBC campus, as it won an award for the American Institute of Architects’ in 2000. It opened in 1996 and has set new green building benchmarks for the world. The building features reused and recycled materials, natural ventilation, highly efficient lighting, grey-water recycling, and composting toilets. UBCs next green building, the Liu Centre for the Study of Global Issues, opened in 2000. This building highlighted the replacement of cement in the concrete mix with fly ash, a waste material from coal-fired power plants to make “high-volume fly ash concrete.” UBC has more plans for innovative buildings and the work is never done.

The Campus Sustainability Office is also looking at improving the sustainability of existing buildings on campus. UBC houses Canada’s largest university energy and water retrofit program. The upgrades generate savings of about $2.5 million annually. Coincidentally, this covers the cost of the Sustainability Office. Not only does the EcoTREK (the program working on the retrofitting of existing buildings) save up to 30% on core energy uses every year, it also reduced CO2 emissions by about 30,000 tons and reduces water use up to 45 percent and saves lots of money. Ecotrek’s project value is $35 million, which is paid by the savings in energy and they have met Kyoto’s targets of CO2 emission decrease by 6 percent below 1997 levels.

However, these successes weren’t unexpected at all. According to Pagani, this was accomplished through projecting and meeting goals. The unexpected successes of the program are the behind-the-scenes interactions and inspirations from the staff and students at UBC. “A community was built for the staff and students at UBC around sustainability,” said Pagani. She was especially excited about the universal bus pass (UPASS) that passed a couple of years ago that increased ridership by 53% and decreased single-vehicle occupancy trip by 20% from 1996. The program has brought attention to all aspects of sustainability, including social and economic sustainability.

The biggest unexpected benefit of the program was the snowball effect that it caused on UBC’s campus. “Every student that comes to the campus must think about sustainability,” said Pagani.