Category: Goals Pages

Graduate Student Achieves Waste Sustainability By Way of Good Relationships

Emily Knipp spent the summer interning for the St. Paul Saints, a minor league baseball team that plays at the Greenest Ballpark in America—CHS Field in St. Paul, Minnesota. Her internship marked the final semester of her accelerated Environmental Conservation program in the Nelson Institute. In just three months, she was able to help the …

Top-Down versus Bottom-Up: Two Approaches to Sustainability

This guest article was written by Jason Gallup, former Student Programs Director at the Office of Sustainability. The window for avoiding the catastrophic effects of environmental degradation is small. As a society, we are now well aware that without major reductions in our carbon emissions, we soon will face irreversible changes to our planet that …

Five Tips for A More Sustainable Summer

Summer is the perfect time to go green! Check out these five sustainability tips for the warm season ahead. Eat Seasonally & Locally (& Go Heavy on the Veggies) Show seasonal produce some love! Treat yourself to nutritious vegetables and fruits that benefit your health, while also supporting local Wisconsin farmers and the planet. Find …

Heavier Rains and Manure Mean More Algae Blooms

A recent UW–Madison study shows that the increased frequency of high-intensity rain events is worsening phosphorus runoff from manure-covered agricultural fields more than scientists expected. To learn more about a new effort aims to address this problem in Dane County, read the full article on the UW–Madison news page here.

Several Hundred People, 11 Pounds of Trash: A Successful Zero Waste Pilot on Earth Day

“Zero waste”—it’s an idea that can feel slightly naïve in our consumerist culture. Nearly everything we do produces waste of some kind. And when large groups of people gather for an all-day event—say, hundreds of attendees at the 2018 Earth Day Conference, hosted by the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies and held at Monona Terrace—the …

Earth Week Celebrations Return to the UW

The Office of Sustainability is celebrating the 48th annual Earth Day with a dynamic week of events. And they aren’t doing it alone: several organizations on campus are working together, including the Sustainability Committee of the Associated Students of Madison, the Multicultural Student Center, F.H. King Students for Sustainable Agriculture, Lambda Theta Alpha Latin Sorority Inc., …

UW–Madison Entrepreneurs Compete in Energy and Sustainability Challenge

Multiple entrepreneurial student teams at the University of Wisconsin–Madison took home cash prizes for new innovations in energy technology and environmental sustainability at the end of February. Read the full article on the Wisconsin Energy Institute news page here.

Bio-renewable process could help ‘green’ plastic

Learn more about how UW–Madison researchers have developed an economical way of producing a critical plastic precursor. Read the full article on the UW–Madison news site here.

Kyoung-Shin Choi: The Worth of Water

Learn more about how Kyoung-Shin Choi and her team are developing a rechargeable desalination cell capable of turning seawater into fresh water with support from the WARF Accelerator Program. Read the full article on the WARF’s website here.

Nina Elder Discusses Art, Sustainability, and Her Visit to the UW

The following is an interview with Nina Elder, who is an artist, adventurer, and arts administrator. Her work focuses on the changing culture and ecology of the American West and on fostering relationships between artists, scientists, and diverse institutions and communities. Elder was at UW–Madison for a week in November as part of the Terra …