In Our Nature

What's plastic film you ask? Plastic film can be a variety of materials including shrink-wrap, bubble wrap and shopping bags.

Effective January 1 2020, UW's plastic film recycling process has changed. Plastic film is no longer accepted in regular recycling bins and will need to be dropped off at specific locations to be recycled.

What types of plastic film are recyclable?

The easiest way to tell if the plastic film can be recycled is the "stretch test." If you can stretch the plastic easily with your...

What do you think of when you hear the word soil? When assistant professor Brittany Johnson asks students this question at the start of her Introductory Soils course, words like "dirty," "life," "brown," and "nutrients" come to mind. But soil is much more complex than that, Johnson says.

Johnson emphasized the many roles of soil in the recent lecture "From the Ground Up: Climate Impacts of and on Soils," part of the Nutritional Sciences winter seminar "Food Systems in the Age of Climate Change." This presentation aimed to...

Every one of us interacts with food on a daily basis in some way. This week, the UW Farm, Campus Food Pantry and ASUW Student Food Cooperative will be discussing various aspects of our food systems as part of the Sustainability Stories seminar series. Also happening this week is a Student Sustainability Forum, movie screening, discussion on diversity and much more.

We highlight the top sustainability-related events across UW each week so you can quickly find the ones you're interested in. We also always have a full, comprehensive list of all campus sustainability events on our...

This Fall, UW Recycling staff once again guest-taught students in the Nutritional Sciences 302 Food Systems class - led by faculty members Yona Sipos and Jennifer Otten - regarding the composting process and how to sort compostable materials on campus. The students were then given an assignment to think about ways the University of...

This week, get your hands dirty at a pair of volunteer events with the Society for Ecological Restoration - UW Chapter, learn how climate change is also changing our soil and what that might mean for future food production, or get a selfie with Dubs while checking out great deals at UW Surplus!

We highlight the top sustainability-related events across UW each week so you can quickly find the ones you're interested in. We also always have a full, comprehensive list of all campus sustainability events on our calendar...

The UW American Indian Studies Department and Na’ah Illahee Fund invite Individual, Panel, or Workshop abstracts for the “Living Breath of wǝɫǝbʔaltxʷ” Indigenous Foods Symposium to be held on May 1 & 2, 2020 at the University of Washington’s wǝɫǝbʔaltxʷ Intellectual House.

Submissions are due on January 20, 2020.

The 2020 theme is “Food is Resistance! Water. Soil. Seeds.” The symposium is seeking abstracts that focus on maintaining and revitalizing Indigenous food systems that resist colonization and center...

There are tons of events happening around the University of Washington. Each week, we'll highlight the top sustainability-related events across UW so you can quickly find the ones you're interested in. We also always have a full, comprehensive list of all campus sustainability events on our calendar. You can even subscribe to get weekly emails to keep up to date on all the sustainability events happening around UW.

This week's events include:

Sustainability...

Join us on Thursday, January 16 at 12 p.m. in Allen Auditorium for the first in the Sustainability Stories @ UW series! UW Recycling and UW Surplus will present on their work reducing waste at the UW. Learn more about what both groups are doing to help keep our waste out of the landfill, followed by time for Q&A and networking.

UW Recycling will give information on the SCRAM (Students Cleanup, Recycle and Moveout) program, which encourages students to donate unwanted items when moving out of residence halls. Last Spring, the program...

The Environmental Chemistry and Hydrology Lab at UW Tacoma hosts undergraduate research projects with an emphasis on freshwater ecosystems, along with a long term Superfund project looking at metal contamination in water and organisms in local lakes. As a result of their environmental health related research, sustainability is at the forefront of the minds of the lab's researchers.

Lab manager Erin Hull notes that in keeping sustainability in mind at work, many researchers make it a habit at home too. Their UW Green Laboratory Gold Certification...

Residents of the new North campus dorms may not notice the many sustainability features of their buildings. If they take a closer look, they’ll find the residence halls are rich with hidden touches that save energy and make living easier. 

All residence halls on North Campus are LEED certified, meaning they were built with sustainability in mind. Students, though, might not be aware of some features that Housing & Food Services (HFS) implemented.

Capital Planning and Sustainability Manager JR Fulton said HFS considered budgeting,...