Blogs

There are many Green Laboratories at the University of Washington who practice sustainability every day. The Green Lab Certification program was created to recognize these labs, while providing resources for labs who want to improve their practices. This spring, the Green Lab program gave awards to those certified labs which showed outstanding performance even among the select group of certified Green Labs.

Sound Salmon Solutions is seeking two to three long-term Community Stewardship Partners to help with salmon habitat restoration work. Volunteers will help raise public awareness on the decline of salmon populations, water quality problems and solutions.

HP’s printers, ink cartridges, and desktops can be found in administrative offices and computer labs throughout campus. HP is one of the UW’s main technology suppliers, and the company has many sustainability initiatives. Sustainability is firmly integrated into the company’s product design process, which aims to decrease the environmental impact of products across their life cycles. Due to its industry leadership in sustainability, HP has received much external recognition in recent years.

CSR Thursdays is a student-authored blog post series in which we share information about the corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts underway by the many and diverse suppliers and vendors of the UW. Look no further to start gaining an understanding on what businesses that provide products often purchased by students, faculty, and staff are doing to promote environmental sustainability! 

This week’s company: Tiffany & Co.

UW Environmental Studies majors gathered in Alder Hall last week to present their capstone projects, which ranged from in-depth looks at millennials’ involvement in environmental advocacy to research on improving our connectedness with nature.

“I’m always impressed by students,” said capstone instructor Sean McDonald. “They apply their environmental degree to the professional world.”

The UW relies primarily on freshwater purchased from Seattle Public Utilities to water landscaped areas on campus. A group on campus wants that to change.

A team of students, faculty and staff are proposing to alter the existing irrigation system to distribute rainwater as opposed to fresh drinking water, and they received a Green Seed Fund grant to help make it happen.

Spring quarter is nearly over, which means students will be packing up in preparation for summer moves. Often, this means discovering that you have more stuff than you can (or want to) take with you, but don't throw those unwanted items away! UW Recycling is making it easy for students to donate or dispose of unwanted items.

Over six million gallons of water is used to sustain the assortment of trees and flowers in the Washington Park Arboretum, much of it along Azalea Way, the main pathway through the Arboretum. But a group of UW students, staff and faculty are hoping to significantly reduce the amount of water used.   

At 15 feet tall, the new hoop house for the Society for Ecological Restoration's UW Chapter (SER-UW) serves as a reminder of all the hard work 50 student volunteers put in over the course of six days.

Working eight to ten hour shifts, students from UW’s Construction Management department, Sigma Lambda Chi and volunteers from SER-UW set out to construct a 30 foot by 48 foot hoop house at the Center for Urban Horticulture. Now, the student run native plant nursery has room for about 5,000 plants in the hoop house.

There's a whole new lineup of sustainability events this week, ranging from environmental studies students presenting their green projects to marine conservation. Some of the week's highlights are listed below, and you can find out even more items happening on campus with our full Sustainability events calendar, which is the best place to find the most up-to-date listings and details on all events. If you know of any events that should be added to the calendar, please let us know.