INITIATIVES

"President Hanlon has called on Dartmouth to play a leadership role in improving global sustainability and overcoming the challenges of climate change. The Sustainability Task Force has been charged with developing plans supportive of this goal. Although Dartmouth has substantially reduced campus energy use and made other significant advances over the last decade, we lag our peer institutions with respect to commitments, actions, and reporting in the sustainability domain. The best available science indicates that, in order to limit temperature rise to 2 degrees centigrade, greenhouse gas emissions must be decreased by at least 80% by 2050. Our report recommends principles, standards, and commitments in the areas of energy, waste and materials, water, food, transportation, and landscape and ecology. Energy is the largest contributor to Dartmouth's greenhouse gas emissions and is also the area where prior analysis best positions us to take action. We believe that providing 50% of campus energy from renewable sources by 2025 and 100% by 2050 is feasible. For campus operations other than energy, we recommend timelines for data gathering and goal-setting. Looking beyond campus operations, Dartmouth has opportunities to maximize our impact by initiatives involving integration of sustainability into our curriculum, out-of-classroom activities and research and scholarship. We believe that the tension between fiscal and operational constraints and sustainability imperatives is healthy. This tension focuses the tradeoffs and allows us to determine how we might gain the most benefit possible per unit of spending. Open discourse and continuous fine-tuning of our goals will allow our investments to produce the greatest possible impact, and enable us to build a model that can be sustained and replicated." From the Office of the President