The City of Boulder and the Environmental Center at CU will be resuming the Greek Sustainability Program in the upcoming weeks.
The sustainability outreach program aims to improve energy and water conservation, weatherization of the Greek houses, the recruitment of a Green Chair and the involvement of the Greek Community, according to the Environmental Center website.
The program was originally approved and partially funded by the City of Boulder for the spring 2011 semester, with nine confirmed Greek houses participating in the recycling aspect of sustainability.
Daniel Baril, the recycling program manager for the Environmental Center, said it is a possibility that more than the nine confirmed houses participated in the pilot program.
“Last spring we definitely had nine Greek houses, if not more, doing household recycling,” Baril said. “The participating sororities included Alpha Phi, Delta Delta Delta, Kappa Kappa Gamma and Chi Omega. Sig Ep, Sigma Pi, Sigma Nu, Theta Ki and Pi Kappa Phi were the fraternities.”
Susan Beckett, the energy program manager for the environmental center, said the Greek sustainability program will be up and running again once a Greek sustainability coordinator is hired.
“We’re hoping to hire a coordinator that’s interested in doing student outreach,” Beckett said. “The Greek houses will work with the coordinator during assessments and installing things that would save energy.”
The staff at the environmental center hopes to improve the Greek sustainability significantly in comparison to last year.
“We need to work even harder to change things,” Beckett said. “Now that we’re fully funded by the City of Boulder, we want to save as much water and energy in the Greek houses as possible.”
Baril hopes to take this goal even further by implementing composting.
“Last year we only had recycling opportunities in the houses,” Baril said. “This year we’ll take the next step and try to get the Greek houses to start composting.”
The environmental center offers presentations, (as well as free recycling bins to place inside of the houses,) to help educate the students on sustainability.
“The Greek Sustainability Program is an initiative to improve sustainability efforts within the CU community,” Baril said.
For more information on the CU Greek Sustainability Program and other sustainability efforts check out the environmental center’s website.
Contact CU Independent News Budget Editor Lauren Archuletta at Lauren.archuletta@colorado.edu
