University of Wisconsin–Madison
Travis Blomberg, the campus resource coordinator for the Office of Sustainability (O.S.), won the Nelson Institute’s Rising Star Alumni Award for 2023. We sat down with Travis to speak about his experience at the Nelson Institute, his journey through multiple educational disciplines and jobs, his most significant initiatives at the O.S., and how students passionate about sustainability might find inspiration in his career.
After years of collaboration with the Green Fund, several student organizations, and other local partners, the UW Arboretum celebrated the installation of a new solar array this spring. The event, "EmPOWERing Youth for a Brighter Future," brought together more than fifty high school and college students to discuss climate change and create community.
When Malorie Garbe became the Sustainability Coordinator for University Housing in July 2020, she faced a unique experience with Sustainability Move Out. Her predecessor, Breana Nehls, had developed the program to donate or recycle as many belongings as possible when first-year students departed the residence halls at the end of the spring semester. But in …
On the Office of Sustainability’s 11th birthday, looking back to the first decade—and forward to the next. By Marek Makowski Fifteen years ago, the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus was covered in statistics about recycled tons of bottles, cans, and paper; images of the planet earth; and the logo, or plea, repeated on the facades of …
Fifteen years ago, Kate Nelson was hired as the first full-time chief sustainability officer at UW–Milwaukee. At the time, Nelson had few colleagues at other universities with whom to collaborate, plan, and talk through challenges. “It’s changed a ton,” said Nelson, whose continues to serve as the director of sustainability. “I didn’t even know who …
In our “Where Are They Now?” series, current student interns interview former interns about their experience at the Office of Sustainability, and in particular how that experience has helped them since graduation. In the following entry, Kylie Thomasen relates her conversation with Jackie Millonzi. Jackie Millonzi was an intern at the Office of Sustainability (OS) …
When we mention sustainability, we often reference the large-scale solutions that our climate catastrophe necessitates: global recycling systems, wind farms, solar power, electric cars, even ambitions to relocate our refuse to the moon. Not many of us speak of lighting retrofits. There is no poetry to staring at the ceilings of tired buildings and replacing …
Today’s building specifications are designed for local weather conditions based on historical data. As future weather conditions vary significantly from historic trends due to human-induced climate change, building specifications must be recalibrated away from the weather of the past and towards the weather of the future. Graduate student Gesangyangji is using advanced computer models to …
During the Spring 2021 semester, five UW–Madison students joined the Zero Waste Atlas Fellowship program. Students performed interviews and gathered information from a variety of campus stakeholders to complete its first zero waste assessment. Scoring UW–Madison’s zero waste efforts According to the Post Landfill Action Network (PLAN), the “Atlas Zero Waste Certification creates a high-level …