Reduce, reuse, recycle

Photo By Anna Kebe/The Chameleon. Loyola provides many opportunities for students to recycle.

By Anna Kebe
Chameleon Staff Writer 

Loyola has drilled the concept of green into my mind as a freshman this year. Green is good.

From giving out aluminum water bottles during the first week of school, to the convocation presentation on the documentary No Impact Man, to the “green meal,” one would think that Loyola just might be the greenest university in the country. Loyola even made The Princeton Review’s Guide to 311 Green Colleges again.

But sometimes the awarded greenness of the campus is hard to detect. Rumors of the recycling being dumped into normal trash bins concern students.

What about Loyola’s Water Tower Campus? According to Loyola student Liz Greiwe, “The plates and silverware are not reusable at the Water Tower Campus like at the Lake Shore Campus.”

And the promised state-of-the-art water bottle fountains? Well, there are only two located on this campus, and they do not seem to be put to much use. There are plans to put in many more in all the new buildings being built on campus.

After doing some extensive investigation on the Loyola website, many doubts of Loyola’s green factor dissipates. Loyola has made a commitment to serve the community through transforming Loyola into a green university past academics.

A variety of options for sustainability actions have been put into place with the help of students, faculty, and staff.

Many learning opportunities to “think green” in academic programs are available, such as Solutions to Environmental Problems  (STEP) courses. These classes emphasize all aspects of global environmental problems while encouraging students to become leaders in their fields of study.

The university’s Richard J. Klarchek Information Commons, or better known as the IC, has been a green project on campus since 2005.

The U.S. Green Building Counsel’s Leadership in Environmental Design (LEED) has environmentally engineered the building, keeping in mind the vision of the building’s form, space, function, materials, and construction kept in mind.

Energy consumption is reduced by about 50 percent. Even the five billion pounds of carpet is made of recycled old carpet and soda bottles.

Freshman Arielle Mendoza said, “I didn’t even know the IC was as eco friendly as it is!”

And yet, there is more to come. The LEED green group is not finished.

A new project is in the air just waiting for the Aldermanic support on construction, possibly beginning November 2011 and finishing fall of 2013.

On Kenmore Avenue, two new first year student residence halls and a greenhouse were proposed; construction is planned to begin on those projects in the spring. It is a commitment to sustainable operations and education.

Each facility will contribute to improving Loyola’s green status. Both new resident halls will feature unique green technology that will help reduce Loyola’s footprint on the earth.

So it turns out there is a lot more going on around campus than expected. There is much more we can expect to be energized in the future.

To contact Anna Kebe, email her at akebe@luc.edu.