Tuesday, August 3, 2010

Northeastern University Wins the Prestigious Princeton Review Green Rating

Northeastern University has been chosen to be among 18 select colleges and Universities for the Princeton Reviews Green Rating. In its third annual green review, 18 institutions received the highest score of 99 when measured for the following criterion:

http://www.princetonreview.com/green/press-release.aspx


1) The percentage of food expenditures that goes toward local, organic or otherwise environmentally preferable food

2) Whether the school offers programs including free bus passes, universal access transit passes, bike sharing/renting, car sharing, carpool parking, vanpooling or guaranteed rides home to encourage alternatives to single-passenger automobile use for students

3) Whether the school has a formal committee with participation from students that is devoted to advancing sustainability on campus

4) Whether new buildings are required to be LEED (environmental certification of equipment/appliances) Silver certified or comparable

5) The school's overall waste diversion rate

6) Whether the school has an environmental studies major, minor or concentration

7) Whether the school has an "environmental literacy" requirement

8) Whether the school has produced a publicly available greenhouse gas emissions inventory and adopted a climate action plan consistent with 80 percent greenhouse gas reductions by 2050 targets

9) What percentage of the school’s energy consumption, including heading/cooling and electrical, is derived from renewable sources (this definition included “green tags” but not nuclear or large-scale hydropower)

10) Whether the school employs a dedicated full-time (or full-time equivalent) sustainability officer.

Among the 18 institutions are:

Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ), College of the Atlantic (Bar Harbor, ME), Evergreen State College (Olympia, WA), Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, GA), Harvard College (Cambridge, MA), Northeastern University (Boston, MA), Northland College (Ashland, WI), State University of New York, Binghampton, Unity College (Unity, ME), University of California, Berkeley, Santa Barbara and at Santa Cruz, University of Maine (Oronoro, ME), University of Maryland, College Park, Warren Wilson College (Asheville, NC), West Virginia University and Yale University.

Congratulations to the people in the Northeastern University Sustainability program and their continued efforts to Green the campus. For more information follow the link to: http://www.northeastern.edu/sustainability/