The Peak

New sustainability goals urge increased student involvement

By Kendra Wong

Members from all walks of the community including undergraduate and graduate students, staff, faculty, and the SFU Community Trust gathered in the Diamond Alumni Centre last Friday to discover how SFU is becoming increasingly sustainable. Members in attendance agreed that while SFU is quickly becoming a post-secondary leader in sustainability, the university still has a long way to go in achieving its goals.

KC Bell, the director of special projects at the office of the vice president, legal affairs, moderated the three-hour long event, which included presentations from numerous sustainable on-campus projects and staff at the university.

SFU’s sustainability goals for 2007/2008 worked towards creating a solid presence of people willing to create a more sustainable university. Now that the university has built a solid foundation by which to build a more sustainable community, they are setting their sights on more ambitious goals. Thus far, the students, faculty, and staff have expressed increasing interest in decreasing the university’s carbon footprint.

Helen Doucette, director of procurement services explained that many of the projects they are currently working on are ongoing. She claimed they are in discussion with Staples and are looking into decreasing the amount of stationary deliveries to SFU to once or twice per week, compared to the 279 deliveries Staples normally makes per month, to the Burnaby campus alone.

The fresh water dispenser in the AQ, meant to reduce plastic bottle use, is a demo model that will be removed in approximately a week and a half, but a new one will be installed in subsequent weeks. The dispenser, “just another way to access water,” uses the existing water supply and provides students with a more hygienic alternative to the current water fountains.

However, critics of the water dispenser argue that if the university decides to install more on campus, the physical adaptations may end up being more costly. Doucette countered with the fact that its power consumption is less than a single light bulb per year.

“[There has to be] short term pain for long term gain,” Doucette added.

According to Richard Brown, director of food services, Chartwells is making some noticeable changes to create a more sustainable eating environment. While also being a lower-price alternative to other on-campus restaurants, Tim Hortons has a big air intake exhaust system and no frying systems. Brown further claimed that 90 per cent of the fresh fruits and vegetables provided by Chartwells are grown in Canada.

Alaina Thébault, program coordinator and Charlene Ponto, project coordinator for the SFU Local Food Project, urged the audience to lobby the university for funding, which according to Ponto, will be ending.

The Sustainability Advisory Committee’s 2009-2013 draft goals include reducing the volume of paper utilized in financial transaction processing by 50 per cent, to integrate a sustainability component with environmental health and safety, to have all major retrofitted buildings meet SFU green building guidelines, reduce SFU’s overall utility consumption by two per cent each year, and increase the number of fair trade options by 15 per cent.

In addition to this, the Committee also hopes parking services will provide parking options that are environmentally, financially, and socially sustainable, and Residence will have a comprehensive three to five year green living strategy and plan. Many members were also in favour of creating an office for sustainability that would report directly to the president to identify sustainability goals, promote appropriate actions, coordinate activities, and assist with network building.

The presentations all called for increased student involvement. James McNish, the faculty of environment representative for the Simon Fraser Student Society argued that there are many students willing to help achieve these goals.

Despite McNish’s claim that students are concerned about how sustainable SFU becomes, a mere 10 students showed up at the open house.