Overall Rating Gold - expired
Overall Score 67.33
Liaison Scott Doyle
Submission Date Nov. 25, 2019
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.1

Ithaca College
OP-23: Rainwater Management

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 0.50 / 2.00 Greg Lischke
Director EM&S
OEMS
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Which of the following best describes the institution’s approach to rainwater management?:
No written policies, plans or guidelines, but green infrastructure and LID practices are used

A brief description of the institution’s green infrastructure and LID practices:

There are vegetative roofs on five different buildings on campus.

Since the College has adopted a minimum LEED Silver or equivalent construction/major renovation policy, all new projects will incorporate stormwater management practices.

For the two newest buildings, the Park Center for Business and Sustainable Enterprise and the Peggy R. Williams Center, both LEED-Platinum certified, there are rainwater catchment and reuse systems in place that actively collect rainwater and store it in underground cisterns for use in non-potable water applications (toilet flushing and landscape irrigation). We also used pervious paving near the Williams Center.

Highlights of our Low Impact Development practices:

1) In regards to plant stewardship, we use native plants as often as possible. We have also began planting a number of perennials to provide color in areas that once had non-native plants and annual flower beds.

2) In regards to hydrology use, the College has one permanently installed irrigation system on its soccer field, all other athletic field irrigation is performed with portable irrigation only throughout the summer months when there is not enough precipitation to keep the fields safe. We do not irrigate any campus lawns and try to water plants and flowers when need be with reclaimed water.

The College also maintains over 25 bio-retention structures to assist with the filtering of storm water runoff.

3) Materials Management
The college composts all of its yard waste and owns it own screen plant for which it uses to create planting mixes out of the compost. The college has not outsourced any soils for the past three years since acquiring the screen plant. The college also chips all of the branches and downed trees to create mulch to be used for trails within the Natural Lands.

4) Energy Efficient Landscape design
The college has four buildings on campus that have green roofs. We continually plant shade trees throughout the campus to provide shade, including in all of the islands of our parking lots. We have three areas that we have employed porous pavement on. We also build windbreaks out of shrubs and trees. We attempt to use plants that are drought tolerant and also require little maintenance. All of the walk lighting on campus has been converted to LED and we are in the process of addressing our street lighting.


A copy of the institution’s rainwater management policy, plan, and/or guidelines:
A brief description of the institution’s rainwater management policy, plan, and/or guidelines that supports the responses above:

Please see the attached pdf


The website URL where information about the programs or initiatives is available:
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Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
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