Colgate University
PAE-5: Climate Action Plan

The Sustainability and Climate Action Plan establishes the goal of achieving climate neutrality by 2019.

The Sustainability and Climate Action Plan is a year-by-year roadmap to advance sustainability and achieve climate neutrality by Colgate's bicentennial celebration in 2019. To achieve this ambitious target, we agreed on 27 projects that could be implemented by 2015. We anticipate that these projects would reduce Colgate's greenhouse gas emissions by 35% by 2015 (to 11,249 tons). Projects range from low-cost, high-impact behavior-change strategies such as the Green Office and Green Living Programs, to capital-intensive and technologically complex engineering projects such as the heating plant upgrade (fuel switching from #6 oil to natural gas). By 2015, our goal will be to implement these projects and in the process: eliminate fuel oil #6 consumption on campus by replacing it with natural gas (depending on its future availability in Hamilton, N.Y.). reduce electricity consumption by nearly 5,000,000 kWh reduce fuel oil #2 consumption by over 10,000 gallons reduce gasoline consumption by over 3,000 gallons reduce diesel consumption by 800 gallons reduce water consumption by nearly 6,000,000 gallons reduce landfill waste by over 300 tons reduce paper consumption by over 10,000 pounds reduce food purchasing expenditures by over $100,000 reduce air travel expenditures by nearly $20,000