Overall Rating Gold - expired
Overall Score 67.34
Liaison Jennifer Andrews
Submission Date July 29, 2014
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.0

University of New Hampshire
OP-22: Waste Minimization

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.96 / 5.00 Susanne Bennett
Director
Facilities Operations & Maintenance
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Waste generated::
Performance Year Baseline Year
Materials recycled 506.08 Tons 279.23 Tons
Materials composted 197.67 Tons 121.02 Tons
Materials reused, donated or re-sold 35 Tons 23.23 Tons
Materials disposed in a solid waste landfill or incinerator 1,166.24 Tons 1,121.72 Tons

Figures needed to determine "Weighted Campus Users”::
Performance Year Baseline Year
Number of residential students 7,821 7,466
Number of residential employees 23 23
Number of in-patient hospital beds 0 0
Full-time equivalent enrollment 13,261 13,758
Full-time equivalent of employees 3,286.70 3,454.35
Full-time equivalent of distance education students 28 0

Start and end dates of the performance year and baseline year (or three-year periods):
Start Date End Date
Performance Year Jan. 1, 2013 Dec. 31, 2013
Baseline Year Jan. 1, 2010 Dec. 31, 2010

A brief description of when and why the waste generation baseline was adopted:

2010 is the first year for which we have comprehensive waste and recycling data.


A brief description of any (non-food) waste audits employed by the institution:

In 2013, Trash 2 Treasure conducted a UNH waste audit of of campus, including student move in and move out days.


A brief description of any institutional procurement policies designed to prevent waste:
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A brief description of any surplus department or formal office supplies exchange program that facilitates reuse of materials:

The University System of New Hampshire Purchasing Office facilitates the Surplus Property program. Through the Surplus Property website individuals can browse and/or upload to an online inventory of surplus items (furniture, miscellaneous, audio/visual equipment, computers, research equipment, vehicles) available for sale to university departments and the general public. Surplus may also be transferred to another department, donated to a non-profit organization, create an advertisement for the sale of surplus, or request to scrap obsolete equipment.


A brief description of the institution's efforts to make materials available online by default rather than printing them:

In the spirit of sustainability and in accordance with President Mark Huddleston’s call to restrict printing and mailing costs, after this printing the UNH Campus Directory will be available only online starting in 2010. The online UNH directory for faculty/staff is currently available from the UNH homepage, and the online directories for students and faculty/staff are currently available at blackboard.unh.edu under the My UNH Resources tab: http://www.unh.edu/directories/facstaff.html

Moreover, the undergraduate course catalog complete its transition to online-only delivery with the 2010-2011 edition. The Graduate School's course catalog has been online-only since the 2009-2010 edition. Through Blackboard, students can also view syllabi and course schedules uploaded by instructors, as well as submit papers and exams electronically and register for courses, among other things:

http://blackboard.unh.edu
http://www.unh.edu/undergrad-catalog/choosecatalog.cfm
http://www.unh.edu/grad-catalog/choosecatalog.cfm


A brief description of any limits on paper and ink consumption employed by the institution:

The majority of Student Computer Clusters (SCCs) require Cats Cash to enable printing. Cats Cash is very much like a debit card onto which students (and parents) can deposit money. Standard printing rates are 10 cents per page. There are computer labs on campus where free printing is available. Such locations are monitored by a computer lab technician, and students are instructed to limit their use of free printing to five pages.


A brief description of any programs employed by the institution to reduce residence hall move-in/move-out waste:

UNH has instituted many strategic activities to reduce the amount of waste produced on campus. Recycle Everything New & Used (RENU) was a volunteer-run program started at UNH by a student in 2002. The Ecological Advocates student organization now facilitates RENU. In 2009, RENU collected a total of 2,220 lbs of clothes and shoes for Planet Aid by placing collection boxes throughout campus dormitories. Students use these boxes to discard nonperishable foods and unwanted clothing. RENU donated 20 boxes of food of a variety of types with an average weight of 25 pounds per box and a total of 500 pounds to the Cornucopia Food Pantry in Durham. Recent years have seen as much as 4,800 pounds of food collected. Kitchen items are also donated to the Good Will in nearby Dover.

In an effort to reduce UNH’s impact on landfills, the UNH Student Environmental Action Coalition (SEAC) initiated a program called Trash 2 Treasure (T2T) in 2010, which absorbed UNH-RENU. T2T collects furniture, electronics and other reusable items that students throw away each year, storing it all over the summer, and then holds a large 3-day yard sale during move-in weekend to sell it all back to students. The goal is to create a sustainable program where we will be able to run the program next year with the money we make at the yard sale this year, and so on, for years to come.


A brief description of any other (non-food) waste minimization strategies employed by the institution:
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A brief description of any food waste audits employed by the institution:
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A brief description of any programs and/or practices to track and reduce pre-consumer food waste in the form of kitchen food waste, prep waste and spoilage:

UNH Dining composts all pre-consumer food waste.


A brief description of programs and/or practices to track and reduce post-consumer food waste:

There are three dining halls on the UNH campus. Stillings Hall and Philbrook Hall are completely trayless (Philbrook November since 2008, Stillings Hall since January 2009). Holloway Commons, the largest of the three dining halls, began eliminating trays from its facility through “Trayless Tuesdays” in January 2008. Though trays are still available at Holloway Commons, the result of “Trayless Tuesdays” has been that many students have voluntarily ceased using trays.


A brief description of the institution's provision of reusable and/or third party certified compostable to-go containers for to-go food and beverage items (in conjunction with a composting program):

Compostable containers are used in the UNH Dairy Bar.


A brief description of the institution's provision of reusable service ware for “dine in” meals and reusable and/or third party certified compostable service ware for to-go meals (in conjunction with a composting program):
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A brief description of any discounts offered to customers who use reusable containers (e.g. mugs) instead of disposable or compostable containers in to-go food service operations:

Reusable UNH Dining mugs are given out at the beginning of every year to incoming freshmen and customers for use at UNH retail locations to encourage waste reduction. By presenting the "mug club" mug, customers receive $0.25 off their coffee/tea.


A brief description of other dining services waste minimization programs and initiatives:

UNH Dining does some tray less meals.


The website URL where information about the institution’s waste minimization initiatives is available:
Data source(s) and notes about the submission:

Other contacts:

UNH Dining: David Hill

University System of NH employees can also donate and sell used electronic and other items through USNH Surplus: www.unh.edu/purchasing/surplus/index.html. Also, UNH IT manages the disposal of computers for UNH Durham faculty and staff.

As for ink cartridges, UNH Facilities holds all the printer cartridges until they have a truckload (1 ton pickup), then delivers them to Reliable Technologies in Manchester, NH. The company sorts through the cartridges, keeps those that can be recycled (paying UNH for these) and destroying those that cannot. To create fewer cartridges in the first place, UNH Printing Services offers a “Refill, Don’t Landfill” program in which cartridges can be refilled with ink through Cartridge World.

UNH Health Services is an ambulatory care center offering only out-patient services, i.e. we have no in-patient hospital beds.

Employee Headcount vs. FTE: On an all-employee basis, FTE values aren’t consistent. For adjunct employees, the concept of an annualized FTE value doesn’t really apply as these are mostly part-time, hourly, and/or temporary employees whose % time fluctuates quite a bit over the course of a year.

More informatin on waste reduction available at:

www.sustainableunh.unh.edu/waste

www.unh.edu/purchasing/surplus/index.html

http://it.unh.edu/index.cfm?id=43A69C62-CAE8-B08D-8F3CE7C896E32791

Other contacts: Steve Pesci; Paul Chamberlin; Lisa Pollard


Other contacts:

UNH Dining: David Hill

University System of NH employees can also donate and sell used electronic and other items through USNH Surplus: www.unh.edu/purchasing/surplus/index.html. Also, UNH IT manages the disposal of computers for UNH Durham faculty and staff.

As for ink cartridges, UNH Facilities holds all the printer cartridges until they have a truckload (1 ton pickup), then delivers them to Reliable Technologies in Manchester, NH. The company sorts through the cartridges, keeps those that can be recycled (paying UNH for these) and destroying those that cannot. To create fewer cartridges in the first place, UNH Printing Services offers a “Refill, Don’t Landfill” program in which cartridges can be refilled with ink through Cartridge World.

UNH Health Services is an ambulatory care center offering only out-patient services, i.e. we have no in-patient hospital beds.

Employee Headcount vs. FTE: On an all-employee basis, FTE values aren’t consistent. For adjunct employees, the concept of an annualized FTE value doesn’t really apply as these are mostly part-time, hourly, and/or temporary employees whose % time fluctuates quite a bit over the course of a year.

More informatin on waste reduction available at:

www.sustainableunh.unh.edu/waste

www.unh.edu/purchasing/surplus/index.html

http://it.unh.edu/index.cfm?id=43A69C62-CAE8-B08D-8F3CE7C896E32791

Other contacts: Steve Pesci; Paul Chamberlin; Lisa Pollard

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.