American University
PA-2: Commitments and Planning

American University Signed the ACUPCC in 2009 and the updated Climate Commitment from Second Nature in 2016. 

AU also is a signatory of the District of Columbia Mayor's College and University Climate Pledge which was most recently signed in 2019. 

AU is also a signatory to America is All In.

https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/commitments.cfm 

From the 2021 Sustainability Plan, progress is overseen by the Office of Sustainability. https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/sustainability-plan/ 

Goal 1.1: Substantially increase the number of courses identified as sustainability focused or related.

Goal 1.2: Support continued and expanded scholarship related to sustainability, specifically adaptation and resilience, wellness, and environmental justice.

Actions:

• Substantially increase the number of courses identified as sustainability focused or related.
• Support AU’s Year of Climate Action (AY 2021-2022) by partnering with other environmental units on campus to catalyze and create a strong linked calendar of events.
• Create a program to support faculty who wish to integrate sustainability into an existing class. Recruit from across schools to increase the number of departments that offer a sustainability course.
• Support library efforts around the expansion of open access publishing.
• Create resources for faculty members to include adaptation and resilience, wellness, and environmental justice into their classes.
• Secure funding for an annual award that will recognize a member of the faculty who has embodied sustainability in scholarship through the generation of new knowledge or practices.
• Work with the new cross-campus Center for Environment, Community, and Equity to promote research and community engagement opportunities for AU students.

From the 2021 Sustainability Plan, progress is overseen by the Office of Sustainability. https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/sustainability-plan/ 

Goal 4.1: Increase involvement from students, staff, and faculty in co-curricular and other sustainability activities.

Goal 4.2: Improve sustainability literacy and expand a culture of sustainability across the AU community.

Goal 4.3: Increase communication efforts to inform the AU community about grounds, energy, zero waste, transportation, dining, and other campus sustainability efforts.

Actions: 

• Continue to organize sustainability-focused events, campaigns, competitions, volunteer opportunities, and campus tours.
• Renew and grow our support for sustainability-focused student organizations.
• Continue to hire a cohort of undergraduate interns to conduct sustainability engagement activities across campus.
• Increase participation in the Green Office Program and create new tools to encourage sustainable workplace behaviors. Expand program to recognize offices that create tailored sustainability plans.
• Host workshops and presentations focused on applying sustainable practices at home and work.
• Create engagement plan to increase participation and knowledge around zero waste, energy, and other sustainability efforts.
• Conduct bi-annual sustainability literacy and culture survey.

Goal 5.1: Expand and create partnerships across the District to meet shared sustainability and resiliency goals.

Goal 5.2: Offer sustainability educational programs to the community.

Goal 5.3: Continue and expand our involvement in local and global sustainability policy development.

From the 2021 Sustainability Plan, progress is overseen by the Office of Sustainability. https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/sustainability-plan/ 

Goal 8.1: Decrease existing building energy consumption to align with DC’s Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS) for universities.

Actions: 

• Continue to implement energy saving measures across campus, building off the 30% per square foot energy efficiency improvement already achieved.
• Increase outreach around plug load management and other behavior change initiatives.

Goal 9.1: Review and update building management practices to align with best practices for sustainability.

Goal 9.2: Expand sustainability data sharing across campus.

Goal 9.3: Grow the number of LEED Green Associates and LEED APs within campus staff.

Actions: 

• Conduct a campus-wide review of all buildings using LEED Operations and Maintenance (O+M) tools to evaluate performance related to efficiency, water, waste, indoor air quality, transportation, refrigerant use, etc.
• Update building maintenance plans from the previous sustainability plan to reflect new O+M standards.
• Investigate ARC and other tools for data sharing.
• Create an online dashboard to share sustainability data.
• Partner with offices on campus who work on buildings to promote LEED resources and expand the number of LEED professionals on campus.

Goal 10.1: Expand and diversify the campus tree canopy.

Goal 10.2: Increase stormwater management capacity.

Goal 10.3: Grow the use of edible plants and pollinator-friendly species. Expand participation in the edible campus initiative.

Goal 10.4: Establish campus-wide design and management standards for landscape construction and design that incorporate native and adaptive species.

Goal 10.5: Expand educational opportunities and connections for student learning and networking through the landscape.

Actions: 

• Investigate the best opportunities to utilize AU’s efforts to gain water retention credits.
• Reduce campus hardscape.
• Maintain green roofs to capture rainwater and provide educational opportunities.
• Redesign the quad to narrow walkways and reduce impervious surfaces.
• Formalize goals and standards for campus projects that lend themselves to rethinking landscape design.
• Partner with off-campus organizations that share common goals and expand campus initiatives to bring students into projects.
• Work with academic departments to provide hands-on learning opportunities, research opportunities, and other education opportunities for water management.
• Create interactive map showing water management techniques used on campus.
• Continue to evaluate replacement options for all roofs.
• Research water retention methods for use on campus and expand permeable surfaces areas.
• Gather a working group to review water usage, design for impact, or operational efficiency for all of AU’s properties and to research grant opportunities.

Goal 11.1: Achieve Zero Waste (90% diversion) by 2030.

 Goal 11.2: Eliminate single use plastics on campus.

 Goal 11.3: Capture 100% of pre-consumer organic waste for composting from every dining location on campus.

 Goal 11.4: Increase single stream recycling rate by 50%.

 Goal 11.5: Decrease overall campus waste by 20% by 2030.

Actions: 

• Implement a surplus system on campus to reuse, redistribute, and donate campus furniture and other items.
• Complete an internal study to determine scope of avoidable waste items.
• Work with contracts to develop waste minimization strategies in purchasing.
• Develop a plastic reduction plan to eliminate single use plastics on campus and ensure all food service packaging is easily recyclable or compostable.
• Partner with faculty and staff groups to organize office supply exchanges.
• Partner with dining to develop a system to capture post-consumer waste.
• Develop training routine for housekeeping staff and recycling staff to ensure proper waste management.
• Ensure 100% of construction projects are using LEED sorting facilities for construction and demolition debris and capture data for all construction projects.

Goal 12.1: Reduce single-occupancy vehicle traffic to campus.

Goal 12.2: Implement carbon-reducing technology and increase sustainability standards for the AU fleet.

Goal 12.3: Improve tracking methods to capture university travel information for GHG inventory.

Actions:

• Continue to evaluate sustainability and MPGs for new campus fleet vehicle selection.
• Explore utilizing electric buses for campus shuttle service and investigate grant opportunities for the electrification of shuttle buses.
• Expand options to reduce vehicle traffic to campus, including creating incentives for public transportation, incentivizing use of EVs, encouraging ride shares, expanding telework, continuing UPass, and exploring housing options.
• Increase “first-mile” and “last-mile” transportation options to encourage the use of public transportation.
• Encourage carbon-free transportation options.
• Work with campus partners to better track university travel and identify alternatives.

From the 2021 Sustainability Plan, progress is overseen by the Office of Sustainability. https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/sustainability-plan/ 

Goal 3.1: Review sustainability programming to identify opportunities to improve inclusivity and work to continuously improve inclusivity in programming.

Goal 3.2: Connect ongoing sustainability work with issues of environmental justice

Actions: 

• Work with CTRL to incorporate inclusive teaching practices into best practices for green teaching.
• Review sustainability outreach materials, utilizing campus resources, to improve inclusivity.
• Incorporate environmental justice into sustainability outreach.
• Incorporate environmental justice into sustainability curriculum expansion efforts.
• Connect campus inclusive event and green event guidelines.

From the 2021 Phase 2 Inclusive Excellence Plan, overseen by the Office of Inclusive Excellence.
Inclusive Excellence Goals and Actions: https://www.american.edu/president/diversity/inclusive-excellence/goals.cfm 

From the 2021 Sustainability Plan, progress is overseen by the Office of Sustainability. https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/sustainability-plan/ 

Goal 13.1: Develop support for offices to purchase from Local, Small, and Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (LSDBE) businesses and help offices make educated and informed decisions about inclusivity and sustainability in purchasing.

Goal 13.2: Reduce paper usage and paper waste on campus.

Goal 13.3: Support sustainable durable goods vendors.

Actions:

• Continue to remove unnecessary desktop printers by year 3 of the print management project.
• Expand digitization of business practices and other campus processes to reduce paper usage, such as implementing electronic signature systems.
• Create resources to support offices in their purchasing decisions.
• Develop or utilize resources to support purchasing furniture and other durable goods
• Analyze plastic purchasing across campus and work with offices to eliminate single use plastics.

Goal 15.1: Maintain carbon neutrality through continued efforts to decrease gross emissions and the purchase of offsets that align with emissions sources and provide community and educational benefits.

Goal 16.1: The Sustainability Advisory Committee will review sustainability progress and direct relevant issues to the Advisory Committee on Socially Responsible Investing (“ASCRI.”)

Goal 16.2: Integrate sustainability into the implementation of the Strategic Plan and Campus Plan.

Actions:

• Transition the current advisory committee into a formal standing Sustainability Advisory Committee to review sustainability goals, actions, and issues.
• Sustainability Committee will meet twice a year to review progress towards goals and facilitate collaboration.
• The Office of Sustainability will implement the Sustainability Plan for American University. This will involve an escalation plan for the Sustainability Advisory Committee, a timeline for strategic execution, a dashboard to track goals, and a governance framework.
• Partner with office across campus to demonstrate how sustainability is inherently connected to everything we do on campus.
• Elevate sustainability in discussions around campus through sustainability staff volunteering on campus wide committees.

American University participated in a DC wide, university focused resiliency planning effort in 2017. Following the district-wide workshop, AU held an AU specific workshop in January 2018 to identify resiliency needs for the univeristy. 

https://secondnature.org/wp-content/uploads/Resilience-Planning-for-Washington-D.C.-Universities.pdf 

https://reporting.secondnature.org/ip/resiliencePublic!772 

AU participates in the DC Mayor's College and University Sustainability Pledge which includes resiliency. Signatories meet quarterly to discuss pledge progress which includes resiliency efforts. 

https://doee.dc.gov/service/college-university-sustainability-pledge 

Elements from the 2018 Resiliency Assessment were included throughout AU's sustainability plan in 2021 and continued action was specified under 6.2. 

https://secondnature.org/wp-content/uploads/Resilience-Planning-for-Washington-D.C.-Universities.pdf 

https://reporting.secondnature.org/ip/resiliencePublic!772 

From the 2021 Sustainability Plan, progress is overseen by the Office of Sustainability. https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/sustainability-plan/ 

Goal 6.2: Understand current resiliency of campus systems to prepare for the expected increase in heat waves and significant rain events.

Actions: 

• Investigate and plan for potential resiliency issues related to municipal potable water supply, at-risk tree limbs, impact of prolonged snowfall, extreme water impact on campus, fossil fuel reliance.
• Investigate and plan for flooding capacity, navigating campus in extreme weather, power outages and generator capacity.
• Investigate options for future construction to reduce risk from rising utility costs.

AU's 2021 Sustainability Plan: https://www.american.edu/about/sustainability/sustainability-plan/