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In recent years, I feel like the terms Earth Day and sustainability have become almost synonymous. They’re used in connection with each other all the time, and this year, I thought what better way would there be for me to celebrate Earth Day then to do a little bit of research on the place I spend 90% of time in: Lasell University? Luckily for me, Lasell has a sustainability page on its main website, so this research was relatively easy yet still very eye-opening. I was super surprised by how little I actually knew about how our campus works to be as sustainable as possible!
The Dining Hall
Valentine Dining Hall is the place every student on campus visits, so I would hope that our dining hall strives to be as sustainable as possible. Since I’ve gone to Lasell, we haven’t used trays, and according to the website, this has helped us to reduce food waste. Additionally, Lasell has a composting partnership with CERO, which is a commercial composting company that works to provide individualized organic waste recycling services for any organization. Lasell first made this partnership in 2017, and since then, the school has diverted 203,913 pounds of food waste from landfills. And, this partnership has also allowed Lasell to save 97 tons of CO2 from entering the atmosphere. Lastly, the dining hall at Lasell also has a partnership with Mass Biofuel. This partnership enables us to use recycled cooking oil, and the proceeds made from the purchase of this cooking oil directly help to heat the Pine Street Inn homeless shelter in Boston, MA.
Facilities Management
Currently at Lasell, there are 24 refillable water bottle stations on campus (with more hopefully coming soon!). These are in all of the academic buildings, such as the Science & Technology Center (STC), Winslow Academic Center, and the Donahue building among others. All showers and toilets at Lasell are low-flow, and all appliances are Energy Star appliances. Boilers and burners have a 90% efficiency rating for heating and cooling, and all windows and doors are energy efficient. There are water containment tanks across campus that collect rainfall and reuse it for irrigation purposes. Additionally, this irrigation system turns off automatically or when sufficient moisture or rainfall has been detected. One other really cool thing Lasell does in terms of managing its facilities is using all green, clean cleaning products.
Transportation
Nearly everyday I see Lasell’s police officers cruising around campus, so it’s nice to know that two of these police cruisers are hybrid vehicles, and five of them are fully electric. On campus, there is a two-stall electric vehicle charging station, but hopefully another or a few more will soon be added! There are bike racks across campus for students who’d like to use them, and Lasell also offers discounted MBTA Charlie Cards for students. Lasell also works with Sullivan Tire, a partnership which aims to convert all Plant Operations vehicles to bio-based motor oil.
Trash & Recycling
Lasell utilizes a single-stream recycling system and also has recycling and trash rooms located in all residence halls. There are recycling and trash bins across campus as well, and all of these are made out of recycled plastic. Lasell also has a program entitled Lasell Leftovers, in which students and faculty at the end of the year have the opportunity to place any unwanted items in collection bins. These bins then get distributed to non-profit organizations such as Big Brother Big Sister Waltham, Pet Supplies Plus, the Newton Food Pantry, and local elementary schools. Furthermore, Lasell has yet another partnership with Veolia Lighting Recycling, in which we recycle all spent or older fluorescent light fixtures. Plus, all of our older and worn-out furniture on campus is repurposed for use by Third World countries. This is through a partnership Lasell has with The Reuse Network (IRN) Surplus Property Program.
Overall, Lasell has developed and maintained a ton of committed partnerships in order to facilitate more sustainable efforts, and I applaud their efforts thus far. I hope the school can meet its goal of reducing its carbon emissions by 80% by the year 2050, and I hope they continue to create new partnerships with organizations in order to increase the sustainability of our campus.
Happy Earth Day!