Portland State’s 50-acre urban campus is a vibrant, living laboratory modeling sustainability not only for the campus community, but also for the city, region and beyond. In 2010, campus leaders committed to changes that would make PSU’s operations carbon-neutral by 2040. Today, PSU uses 24% less total electricity than it did a decade ago and nearly 9% less per student, staff and faculty member. A detailed sustainability dashboard tracks improvements, providing the community with proof of progress and reason to hope that more can be achieved (pdx.edu/sustainability/sustainability-dashboard). As a result of this work, PSU is consistently ranked as one of the top 50 sustainable colleges in the U.S. by Princeton Review’s Guide to Green Colleges and the Sierra Club’s Cool Schools. Here’s just a sampling of what makes our campus green. 1. LEED LEADER PSU is committed to no less than an LEED Gold rating for all new construction and major renovations. Currently, 17 campus buildings are LEED certified and three—the Karl Miller Center, Lincoln Hall and Robertson Life Sciences Building—have a Platinum rating, the highest available. LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, is the most widely used green building rating system in the world. 2. RECLAIMING PAVEMENT A colorful student street mural is the newest addition to the one-block Montgomery Plaza, closed to traffic since 2019. The plaza is part of the award-winning Montgomery Green Street project, a collaboration between PSU, the City of Portland, and private developers, demonstrating innovative ways to manage stormwater while developing a 13-block corridor more welcoming for bikes and pedestrians. 3. EMBRACING REUSE PSU’s reuse programs divert materials from landfills and help community members save money. At the ReUse Room in Cramer Hall, students and employees select what they need for free from donated surplus office, school and home supplies. That includes water bottles and mugs (forgotten all over campus) that are collected, washed and rehomed. 4. EFFICIENT ILLUMINATION All new campus lighting and all parking garages use energy-efficient LED bulbs, and all others are being transitioned. LEDs use about 90% less energy and last up to 25 times longer than traditional bulbs, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. PSU uses occupancy sensors for stairwells, classrooms and other areas where people come and go to dim or switch off lights when the area is unoccupied. 5. SEED SAVERS At PSU since 2011, the Rae Selling Berry Seed Bank and Plant Conservation Program is the country’s first seed bank dedicated exclusively to rare and endangered plants. Its goal is to safeguard the survival of native plant species so they can be used for ecological restoration efforts and rare plant research. 6. REDUCING RUNOFF To support healthy streams and rivers, PSU employs a wide variety of stormwater management practices, including rainwater harvesting, bioswales, rainwater planters, permeable pavers and eco-roofs that decrease and filter stormwater runoff. Eight campus buildings and several smaller structures support ecoroofs. The newest, on the Vanport Building, covers nearly two-thirds of the roof. 7. SUN POWER Six campus solar photovoltaic arrays draw power from the sun. The three biggest are on the Millar Library, Lincoln Hall and Vanport Building; another two top Cramer Hall and the Science Research and Teaching Center. There’s also a small array on the Academic & Student Recreation Center. 8. RECYCLED TURF Stott Community Field may look like ordinary grass, but it’s made of 20,000 recycled tires. It requires no chemical fertilizers and reduces PSU’s carbon footprint by eliminating the need for fuel-powered maintenance. 9. COMMUNITY FOOD Volunteers from the Student Sustainability Center care for more than 30 species of fruit trees in the Community Orchard. Harvests are donated to the PSU Food Pantry. 10. TREE VITALITY The aging Norway maples lining six blocks of Southwest Broadway Street are gradually being replaced with a variety of tree species, thanks to PSU’s Broadway Arboretum Project. Its goal is to increase tree diversity, provide research opportunities, pilot enhanced tree care techniques, and evaluate which species show climate change resilience. PSU has been recognized as a Tree Campus USA six years in a row for its work preserving and growing the tree canopy. MAPPING ON-CAMPUS CLIMATE EFFORTS leading to gentrification. She and her team will interview forest managers, city officials, nonprofit organizations and community members to ask questions such as: Are people who manage urban forests a diverse group? Do people in the hottest areas get a say in where to add trees and parks in their neighborhoods? If they’d prefer different investments in their community, will their voices be taken seriously? “I’m not just looking at the distribution of harms, but how they are produced in society. What factors and decisions enable the production of harm, who are the decision makers, and who are the people affected by those decisions?” Ajibade says. “How is it that we’ve allowed these things to continue, unintentionally or intentionally? And what are some of the policies we currently have to address these inequalities?” What sets PSU apart is this community- based approach, says Allen, a public policy expert who chairs the Oregon Parks Commission. “Many, many universities and colleges are working on climate…and we have good scientists doing the same rigorous work as other universities,” she says. “But our context and our opportunity is that community-based aspect and our willingness to celebrate work that can have an impact outside the university.That’s not the case in a lot of universities.” The challenge now is for more people at PSU to connect with what communities are asking for, says Todd Rosenstiel, a plant biologist and dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, who with Allen is leading a committee to refocus PSU around climate action.They will host a campus symposium May 12 where government officials, civic leaders, community-based organizations, employers and others can explain their most pressing climate-related problems. “Before we jump in as academics often do and say, ‘Oh, here’s my big idea.This is what I want to do,’ let’s actually take a moment to hear what is needed of us,” Rosenstiel says. “If we do that with enough intentionality and diversity, I really believe everyone at PSU, regardless of school or college or department, will find a way they can show up and have some agency in helping the metro region respond to and prepare for climate change.” CONNECTING DIVERSE RESEARCH Allen and Rosenstiel’s committee is currently taking stock of PSU’s array of climate-related research. It’s a huge task. From architecture to public health, business to biology, nearly every part of the university is engaged in answering the question of how we can ensure a habitable planet for future generations. Chemists are exploring new ways to capture the sun’s energy and convert it into usable fuels that don’t add carbon to the atmosphere, as geographers assess how a warming climate affects water quality. Engineers test technologies that could reduce energy use in buildings and evaluate SPRING 2022 // 23
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