Universities, K-12 schools, and local/state governments are all using the innovative GRF model to help decarbonize their campuses and communities. The report tracks the latest trends and highlights best practices to enable more institutions and communities to learn about and adopt this funding model. The result of surveying 66 institutions, this report examines trends in how GRFs are established and managed, highlights the benefits they provide, and addresses perceived barriers to creating one.

Key findings include: 

• Cumulative project investment provided by these GRFs is over $1.3 billion.
• Projects financed by the GRFs in this survey tend to achieve a 17 percent return on investment (ROI) and have a payback period of five years.
• Nearly 2,200 projects that reduce resource consumption have been financed by the GRFs in the survey.
• Asked whether their GRF had changed how much they are able to get done, over 90 percent of respondents said that having a GRF allows their institution to finance more sustainability projects.

Since 2010, SEI has been developing resources to support institutions that are considering or in the process of establishing a GRF, including implementation guides, case studies, and trend reports like the current one.

“Revolving funds present an exciting win-win-win opportunity to lower operating costs, reduce resource use, and improve the quality of an institution’s facilities all at the same time. They are a very flexible mechanism used by very small organizations to large state governments,” said Mark Orlowski, Founder and Executive Director of the Sustainable Endowments Institute. 

Two institutions shared how GRFs assist in meeting climate neutrality goals: 

“Establishing a revolving energy fund at the University of Michigan has strengthened our energy conservation work across all university facilities. This is an important, early component of our pursuit of achieving carbon neutrality,” said Kevin Morgan, Manager, Energy Management, Office of Campus Sustainability at the University of Michigan.

Trevor Ledbetter, Director of the University of Arizona Office of Sustainability, said, “Our Utility Modification Revolving Fund has provided a valuable case study of how investing in energy efficiency can be leveraged to provide ongoing financial resources for improvements that support our climate neutrality goals. Based upon the success we have seen in only two years, we are now actively investigating how additional seed funding sources can grow our fund to further accelerate our efforts.”

The report is available for free online at www.RevolvingFunds.org

GRITS Goals: Building a Path Towards Carbon Neutrality

GRITS is already helping replace spreadsheets for tracking energy, financial, and carbon savings from users’ sustainability projects. We are now working to develop GRITS Goals, a new suite of features within GRITS that will empower users to develop detailed climate and sustainability action plans by assembling projects into resource reduction scenarios.

GRITS Goals will combine GRITS’ business case analysis, customizable project timelines, and dynamic charting to map out pathways from business as usual to aggressive energy, carbon, and other resource reduction targets. It will also help optimize project sequencing and execution timelines to allow for more precise planning.

GRITS Goals will measure users’ progress towards sustainability goals and include an optional live public dashboard displaying key progress metrics. This will be the largest single expansion of GRITS’ capabilities since its launch on Earth Day in 2014.

“Philly Skyline – South Street Bridge – Golden Hour” by hao$ is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Upcoming Webinar: Jan 15, 2020, 2pm Eastern

To learn more about GRITS and how to harness the power of an integrated project tracking platform, we encourage you to attend an upcoming webinar on the latest features in GRITS 3.5 along with a case study by the City of Philadelphia’s Dominic McGraw, Efficiency & Projects Manager. This webinar will provide insight into how a large municipal user sets up, monitors, and leverages GRITS to advance their energy efficiency goals. Register here!

Little Videos

We have some new short videos for you all! Take a look at this: a quick tour of how Colgate University has used GRITS to track their project savings. Here’s another – a great overview of how the Vermont State Energy Management Program has harnessed GRITS to simplify their GHG reduction efforts in Vermont.

3,000 Projects!

Look to the right side of this screenshot from our homepage: 3,000 Completed Projects! Our community of users across hundreds of campuses, municipal portfolios, and other collections of buildings—including many of you—have made a difference. Now take a look at the energy, financial, and carbon savings that have been achieved.  Each project is adding up to our shared mission to reduce energy expenditure and move toward lower greenhouse gas emissions. Congratulations!

Social Media

We’re on Twitter! Send us your handles, or tweet at us @goGRITS – we would love to engage with you and share stories about resource efficiency projects. And to kick things off, we’d like to hear about how GRITS facilitates your sustainability work. One of the ways GRITS makes life easier is by eliminating the need for spreadsheets. Please share your stories with us on Twitter and tag it #ditchspreadsheets!

Here’s to a happy holiday season and to a great 2020! Cheers to you!

GRITS 3.5 is Live

We recently released the newest version of GRITS, headlined by the new Notification Center. You can now connect with other GRITS users through the platform and learn about their experiences with implementing projects. More than 800 institutions have access to GRITS through our partnerships or direct subscriptions. Read about the new features in this blog post.

Nearly 3,000 projects completed!

Our community of sustainability champions continue to add their work to the GRITS Project Library, a unique resource for benchmarking and inspiration. You can check out a selection of projects that they have shared in the GRITS Public Library here.

Green Revolving Funds for Airports

We are excited to share an important new resource with you: Revolving Funds for Sustainability Projects at Airports. Written in collaboration with the Rocky Mountain Institute, Cadmus, and Frasca & Associates, the report provides detailed guidance on how to set up a green revolving fund (GRF). Building on the success of GRFs at universities, the authors explore the relevance of this innovative financing model to the airport sector. While written with a focus on airports, nearly all of the content is also directly relevant to universities, K-12 schools, city/state governments and institutions in other sectors.

Portfolio Manager webinar recording available

In collaboration with the EPA’s ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager program, we now offer a free basic GRITS account to Portfolio Manager users. A connection between the two platforms also allows you to quickly import your PM facilities into GRITS. If you haven’t already signed up for a free GRITS account as a Portfolio Manager user, you can do so through this form. You can watch a recording of the webinar here.

Green Schools webinar recording available

In August, through a partnership with the USGBC Center for Green Schools, we co-hosted a webinar to highlight how K-12 schools are using project-tracking tools like GRITS to achieve their sustainability goals. The webinar also featured an in-depth conversation of the green revolving fund model for internal funding of sustainability projects. You can tune in to see how it could work for your school or a school in your community here.

Attending Greenbuild 2019?

Are you attending Greenbuild in Atlanta this November? Our Founder and Executive Director, Mark Orlowski, will be presenting on a panel along with Katie Ross of Microsoft on “Using Internal Sustainability Funds to Drive ESG Performance.” The session is scheduled for Wednesday (November 20) from 4-5pm in Room B308.

We hope to see many of you at Greenbuild 2019!

Upcoming GRITS Demo Drop-ins

Are you interested in learning about GRITS through a live screen share tour? Come attend one of our Zoom webinars – please RSVP through this form.

• October 23 at 3pm EDT
• October 31 at 12pm EDT
• November 6 at 3pm EDT
• November 12 at 12pm EDT

Keep reading for more details or log into GRITS now to see the upgrades for yourself!

P.S. Stay tuned over the next few months as several new features under development will dramatically expand GRITS’ capabilities for climate action planning at an institution-wide level!

New Developments in GRITS 3.5:

• Notification Center
• Clone Projects
• Several new features for users in the United Kingdom
• Additional resources with customizable emissions
• Unlimited users for free accounts
• Historical emissions factors
• New user welcome email
• New custom settings for indicating GRF repayment
• Portfolio Manager sync update

Notification Center

The new Notification Center in GRITS allows you to connect with other users via projects in the Library. When you click into another institution’s Project Detail page from the Library, you’ll now see a “Request Contact” button that will allow you to send a connection request to the Project Lead and most recently logged-in Primary user at that institution. If the request is accepted, GRITS will connect you with your counterpart via email, and from there you can discuss their experience with that project!

Access the Notification Center by clicking on the envelope icon at the top right-hand side of the page. The number of unread notifications appears to the right of the envelope icon. You can see pending connection requests on the Contacts sub-tab.

Another aspect of the Notification Center is that we’ll be able to let you know about new features via a notification within GRITS. You’ll receive an email alert about each new notification unless you turn off the email alert in the Preferences sub-tab.

Clone projects

If you’re planning to enter a project similar to one you’ve already added or simply wish to save time in the data entry process for your next project, you can now create a copy of the projects in your account–just click the “Copy” button on your Project Detail page. The copy will be generated in seconds. Copies of projects marked as Completed will be switched to the Proposed status so as to not immediately enter the Library.

Expanding GRITS to the UK

GRITS is now able to track projects undertaken at institutions in the United Kingdom, with several features added based on feedback from universities in the UK.

GRITS has added UK geography, allowing you to geolocate your facilities at UK addresses.

A new resource—heat—is available for selection under the resources being tracked and saved by projects entered into GRITS. This can be used for institutions reducing their use of district heating systems.

Heat has also been added to the resources whose emissions can be customized. Set up custom emissions factors to accurately calculate carbon savings from Heat projects.

All energy resources in GRITS can now have kWh as their unit of measurement.

Finally, kWh has been added as a platform-wide energy unit of measurement. Select kWh on your Settings page (by clicking on the name of your institution at the top of the page), under the Math, Units, and Stats sub-tab. This will convert energy savings throughout GRITS to kWh (on the Dashboard, Projects tab, Project Detail pages, the Library, and the Reports tab).

Additional resources with customizable emissions

Requests from users have resulted in the addition of natural gas and waste to the list of resources whose emissions can be customized. In the case of waste, you can now apply a custom carbon emissions factor to your waste-saving projects to have GRITS calculate the associated carbon savings.

Unlimited users for free accounts

If you use the free version of GRITS through any of our partnerships, you can now create log-ins for as many members of your team as you like. New users can be added on the People tab, or contact support@gogrits.org if you would like us to create several log-ins for you.

Historical emissions factors

GRITS now incorporates electricity emissions factors from past years when that data is available, so that your project’s carbon savings are derived from the factor for each individual year of its lifespan. This leads to a more accurate lifetime carbon savings calculation. To see the factors year-by-year, navigate to the Emissions Factors sub-tab of the Settings page and click the “historical emissions factors” link.

New user welcome email

Now you can ensure a new team member is aware of their GRITS access without sending them a separate message. Whenever you create a new GRITS log-in for a team member, you can have GRITS send them a welcome email informing them of their access and allowing them to create a custom password. Just leave the “Send Welcome Email” box checked, and upon clicking “Save” to create the new log-in GRITS will also email that person.

New custom settings for indicating GRF repayment

For those using GRITS in green revolving fund (GRF) mode: Previously, when indicating that you intend to pay back additional project savings to your GRF beyond the project cost, you could only set an institution-wide interest rate (extra repayments based on the outstanding project loan) or an institution-wide admin fee (an extra repayment based on a percentage of the project cost). These would be applied to every project. Now you can set up custom interest rates or admin fees for individual projects on the Custom Settings sub-tab on any Project Detail page. You can also apply both at the same time.

Portfolio Manager sync update

If you plan to import buildings from Portfolio Manager through GRITS’ connection to that tool, we have updated the process to accept building shares as soon as the import request is made in GRITS. This should eliminate issues that previously arose when trying to import buildings whose share request had not yet been accepted by the GRITS Webmaster account in Portfolio Manager.

Alongside this change, access to GRITS Unlimited will no longer be automatically included as part of The Challenge. Instead, members will get free GRITS Basic access and the opportunity to upgrade to GRITS Unlimited at 50% off the normal cost.

We’ve made this change for a number of reasons, including to encourage more schools, municipalities, hospitals, and other organizations to join The Challenge without needing to get any type of budget approval. We hope to expand participation to more completely represent the numerous green revolving funds across the country. We also recognize that while many members of The Challenge use GRITS, some institutions do not, and this change will align the cost of GRITS Unlimited access with those that use it.

While Second Nature took a leading role in The Challenge in 2018, including handling invoicing, SEI will resume the role of managing The Challenge in 2019. Because there will be no further invoicing for The Challenge in 2019, SEI will also be handling invoicing for GRITS for those institutions who want continued GRITS Unlimited access.

Going forward, the best contact for both The Billion Dollar Green Challenge and GRITS will be Mark, Aaron, and the SEI team. Second Nature will continue to be a key partner in The Challenge, and SN and SEI recently announced a new GRITS partnership. See the announcement here.

We’re excited about the future growth of the Billion Dollar Green Challenge. In fact, we want to welcome The College of William & Mary as the most recent addition to The Challenge with a $1 million green revolving fund commitment.

Please be in touch if you have any questions.

Keep reading for more details or log into GRITS now to see the upgrades for yourself!

Wiki

Getting assistance when using GRITS just got easier, as we’ve moved the GRITS Guide into an online wiki, which you can access here. Follow the “Getting Started” portion of the wiki if you’re just starting to use GRITS. You can also use the search bar to find the topics you’d like to explore. As GRITS continues to add new features, this wiki will be regularly updated—no need to wonder if you have the most recent GRITS Guide!

Tags

Have you ever wanted to create a custom group of projects that can quickly be analyzed on the Projects tab or graphed on the Reports tab? That is now possible through the new tags feature. Create a custom tag to apply to your projects and use the new Tags filter on the Projects tab to isolate a specific group or groups and view the metrics GRITS calculates.

On the Reports tab you are now able to select a single tag and create a graph of your custom project group. View this graph in “aggregate” form or choose “stacked” to display the savings contribution of each project individually, and then customize further by deselecting individual projects from the graph legend.

Enhanced GRITS user interface

We’ve updated GRITS’s infrastructure, and the platform’s interface along with it. One note in particular: table rows that can be expanded now have a green bar that appears when your cursor hovers over them.

Bulk tagging and deleting

On the Projects tab you are now able to select and modify multiple projects at once with the new bulk selection feature. Use this feature to add a tag to several projects or delete multiple projects simultaneously.

New Reports options and layout

We have streamlined the Reports tab, making the layout more concise and adding additional graphing options. You can now view savings over time by facility, campus, project type, or tag. Each graph can be viewed as an “aggregate” form (solid bars) or “stacked” form, which splits the bars according to the savings of each individual project. You can also view savings to date across these categories. A new format for graphing single projects displays their project status (Proposed, In-progress, or Completed).

This new layout is a precursor to a fully customizable Reports tab that we will be building over the next few months. Stay tuned for it!

Bulk price changes via upload

While GRITS allows you to update your resource prices (and the actual amount saved, if measured directly) for each fiscal year on a project-by-project basis, time constraints may have prevented you from making these updates. Now you can update the resource prices for all of your projects at once! Just send that data to us, indicating the resource type and fiscal years that the prices should apply, and we will input them—improving the accuracy of project calculations by adding additional real-world data.

Customizable stats

Users now have greater control over the metrics that GRITS calculates. In the new “Math, Units, and Stats” sub-tab on the Settings page, you can choose whether GRITS will use median or mean to calculate average values. Median will be the default, because it diminishes the impact of outliers (projects with savings much higher or lower than the rest of your projects). If you choose mean, which is just a simple average, you can also choose whether GRITS will include only relevant projects in your savings calculations (i.e., when calculating average water savings, only projects with water savings will be used to determine the average) or all projects (even those without relevant resource savings).

Log in to GRITS now to see these new features in action!

Expanding the GRITS Universe

Two new locations have been added to GRITS—Australia and New Zealand! We welcome several new users, including Australia’s foremost research universities: the Group of Eight. For all other users, you can use the location filter or the map in the Library to find projects completed by these institutions to compare against your own.

Custom Currencies

As GRITS’ geographical location expands, so has the need for different currencies. All GRITS institutions are now configured to enter financial data in their country’s currency, and GRITS converts to your own currency when you view projects in the Library from different countries. You can view your institution’s currency on the Settings page.

If your institution has campuses that operate outside of your country, you can also customize the currency of each campus and make it the default for all projects linked to that campus.

View campus-level savings graphs

If your institution oversees multiple campuses/sites, you’re now able to generate campus/site-specific graphs in the Reports tab. Use this option to see the energy, financial, and carbon savings achieved for each location’s group of buildings.

Import facilities from Portfolio Manager

If you use the EPA’s Portfolio Manager tool to track building data, you can now import those buildings and their basic characteristics into GRITS. You can find the new “Portfolio Manager” sub-tab under the Facilities tab, where there are instructions for connecting your account to GRITS. After sending a successful connection request and sharing your facility information, you can choose to import buildings into GRITS one-by-one or in bulk—saving significant time.

Step 1: Log into your Portfolio Manager account.

Step 2: Click the “Contacts” link at the top right-hand corner of the page (next to “Help | Sign Out”).

Step 3: Search for “GRITS” in the search bar, then click “connect”.

Step 4: Let us know you’re trying to connect by emailing support@gogrits.org (we check for new connection requests regularly, but this will speed things up).

Step 5: After we accept your request, share your Portfolio Manager properties with us.

You will now be able to click the “load unaffiliated facilities” button in the “Portfolio Manager” sub-tab under the Facilities tab in GRITS.

Click the “Import All Unconnected Facilities” button to import all buildings from Portfolio Manager. You can also use the “Affiliate Facilities” button to import individual buildings, and choose to create a new facility in GRITS or merge data from Portfolio Manager with an existing GRITS facility.

Download facilities data

You’re now able to download a spreadsheet all of your facility information from GRITS, including building name, type, and location. If you don’t currently use the EPA’s Portfolio Manager tool but plan to, you can use this spreadsheet to upload building data to the tool from GRITS.

Public-facing features

GRITS now has several features which enable users to share their project data with the public.

Project Sharing:
Choose to share individual projects with peers, administrators, or others who don’t have access to GRITS. Project-level sharing is enabled by default for your institution (toggle on the Settings page, under the “Sharing” sub-tab), and you can start sharing individual projects by switching it on within each Project Detail page.

Flipping the sharing switch on your Project Detail page will reveal a customized link to your project that can be given to others, even those without access to GRITS, and can be switched off as desired. When at least one project is enabled for sharing, a new filter will appear on the Projects tab allowing you to isolate your sharing-enabled projects.

Clicking the public URL will bring you to the public project page.

Public Library:
Choose to share your completed projects in a library visible to the public. Display your data and project achievements beyond GRITS, inspire others with ways to make their operations more efficient, and raise the profile of your institution.

The Public Library is enabled by default for your institution (toggle on the Settings page, under the “Sharing” sub-tab), and you can start sharing individual projects by moving them from the Eligible Projects column to the Public Library Projects column. The projects will appear in the Public Library in two hours.

Anyone can access the Public Library at: https://app.gogrits.org/library/public

Public Dashboard:
Design your own custom dashboard with several GRITS metrics that you can embed into your institution’s website. Navigate to the Settings page and the “Sharing” sub-tab, then scroll down to the Public Dashboard section.

Choose between four and eight metrics that you would like to display in the Public Dashboard. These are calculated from the projects marked as Completed unless otherwise stated. Then select the preferred layout. Finally, click the “Save and Regenerate” button.

A preview of your Public Dashboard is shown below. Copy the code to the left and embed it into your website to display the Dashboard and share the impact of your GRITS projects.

Log in to GRITS now to see these new features in action!

Custom Emissions (CE) Scenarios

You can now create custom emissions factors for electricity, steam, and chilled water (the three resources that are generated from potentially different mixes of fossil fuels or renewables). Scenarios are created or deleted on the Settings page, under the “emissions factors” tab. You can also view default emissions factors for the three resources here. For institutions with multiple campuses in different locations, you’ll have a different default electricity emissions factor for each location. Steam and chilled water defaults are the same for all locations.

CE scenarios can be applied via a campus or on individual projects. A CE scenario can be set on a campus by clicking to “edit” the campus. This scenario will apply to all projects linked to that campus and is automatically enabled.

A CE scenario can be set on an individual project under the “custom settings” tab on the Project Detail page. To apply it, click to enable emissions settings under the “custom settings” tab and then flip the switch on the “details” tab to “enable custom settings.” Choosing “GRITS default” is also possible on the “custom settings” tab, and will allow projects that are currently affected by a campus-based CE scenario to revert to default emissions factors. Scenarios can be set for all three resources simultaneously.

Custom Resource Price Forecasting

You can now create custom resource price forecasts that show how your resource price and financial savings would change under a given rate of change or set price over various years. A scenario can be created for all resources. Scenarios are created or deleted on the Settings page under the “resource price forecasting” tab.

They are applied in the same way as CE scenarios.

This is how a resource price forecast looks for institutions without a revolving fund:

This is how a resource price forecast looks for institutions using GRITS in revolving fund mode:

Campuses

Do you operate on more than one campus? You can now group your facilities into different campuses and apply custom emissions and resource price scenarios to all projects associated with each campus. This feature is especially useful if you work across a school-wide system or operate in multiple locations.

Create and edit campuses in the Facilities tab. All projects must be linked to a campus. One campus has been created for your institution and each of your projects are attached to it.

Geolocation of facilities and campuses

Both facilities and campuses are geolocated via Google Maps based on their city, street address, or postal code. If no information is entered for a facility, the location of the campus is used to geolocate it. The map appears under the Facilities tab when viewing or editing a facility or campus. You can manually move the pin that specifies the facility or campus’s location or edit the latitude and longitude coordinates below the map for even greater precision.

The Projects tab and Project Library now have the option to turn the table into a map. On the Projects tab, the map displays the location of each project based on the facility it’s linked to. Projects without facilities will not appear on the map. Clicking on the pin displays the name of the facility with the number of projects of each type, such as proposed, in-progress, and completed.

In the Project Library, the map shows the location of each campus. Since all projects are linked to a campus, all projects in the Library appear on the map. Clicking on the pin displays the institution’s name and campus address, along with the number of projects there. Anonymous institutions cannot see the map and their projects do not show up on the map for non-anonymous institutions.

View Projects within your Peer Network

Does your institution belong to a peer network like APPA or the Climate Leadership Network? If so, you can now filter by this affiliation in the Project Library to see exactly what your peer institutions have been up to. Just click to only view projects within your network under the “Affiliations” filter in the Library.

Chat with us online!

Introducing the GRITS chat! When you’re logged into GRITS, you can start a conversation with GRITS staff by clicking the “Contact us!” button on the bottom right-hand corner of the screen. During business hours (EST), we’re available live. At other times, we’ll get back to you within the next business day.

Cover photos

You can now add a cover photo to your projects and display the area you’ve been working on. Upload a photo to the “attachments” section of the Project Details page or use an existing photo that you have already uploaded, and click to display it as a cover photo on the front page of your project. Clicking on the photo zooms into a larger version. If the attachment is marked “private” and then made into a cover photo, only users at your institution can view it.

Let us know if you have any questions about the new features or if you have ideas for future features you would like to see in GRITS! Contact us at GRITS@EndowmentInstitute.org.

Higher Education Endowments & the Paris Climate Agreement: Investing for a Sustainable Future

Monday, October 10 at 2:00 pm eastern

Panel Discussion, Baltimore Convention Center Room 332

Higher education has been leading by example on climate change, striving for climate neutrality in campus operations and promoting education, research, and community engagement for climate solutions. In recent years there has been an increased focus on how endowment investments align with climate and sustainability goals.

As the nations of the world begin work in implementing their commitments under the Paris Agreement, American colleges and universities are uniquely positioned to support and accelerate progress towards meeting emissions reduction targets in the U.S.

This session will include a moderated discussion among leaders in the higher ed sustainability movement, senior administrators, and investment professionals about strategies for coordinated support of the Paris Agreement by higher education. Participants will share what’s happening at their institutions and be invited to join and help shape the future of this new, cutting edge initiative.

Presenters

Georges Dyer, Intentional Endowments Network
Michele Madia, Second Nature
Mark Orlowski, Sustainable Endowments Institute

Finance 201: Financial Analysis and Your Campus Projects

Tuesday, October 11 at 2:00 pm eastern

Panel Discussion, Baltimore Convention Center Room 332

Campus sustainability professionals must frequently build the business case for their work. While they are well versed in environmental issues, knowledge of financial terms may be necessary to write a detailed climate action plan and secure funding. We will focus on the case study of Solar PV. This session is a continuation of last year’s 101 session, with more detailed tools provided, but would be fine for a first-time participant. The session will provide a worksheet to help build a financial picture of your institution, then understanding what type of projects are best suited for this financial picture. We will also give a brief overview of important financial terms: annual ROI, net present value, and internal rate of return. SEI will introduce the Green Revolving Investment Tracking System (GRITS 1.2), which any institution can use calculate these important financial metrics and then export this data to a PDF to present it to finance officers (with case studies of that impact).

Presenters

Brett Pasinella, Second Nature

Mark Orlowski, Sustainable Endowments Institute

Campus Resilience: Prioritizing Goals and Strategies Through Collaborative Gaming ($)

Wednesday, October 12 from 8:30am eastern-12:00pm eastern

Pre & Post Conference Workshop, Baltimore Convention Center Room 321

This workshop engages participants in Campus Resilience, an educational and collaborative campus-building game whose goal is to achieve institutional carbon neutrality while maintaining resilience: campus academic, cultural, environmental, and financial vitality. Based on data from GRITS, ACUPCC, and the RELi Checklist, players work in teams to balance funding of operations, sustainability projects, and student experience and test their campus’ resilience to social, economic, and environmental events over the course of several decades.

During this session, participants of all levels will:
1) Gain a holistic understanding of the interconnected issues impacting resilience, from facilities and curriculum to policy and affordability
2) Explore resiliency decision-making from diverse stakeholder perspectives
3) Discuss scalable learnings that can be exported to their own households, campuses, and regions, and
4) Be inspired by how this new game-based tool can impact real campus decisions

After an explanation of gameplay and supporting research, participants will divide into teams to play the full Campus Resilience game. The session will conclude with a discussion of lessons learned and relationship to real campus experience.

Presenter

Elizabeth Turner, LHB, Inc.

Co-Presenters

Erika Bailey-Johnson, Bemidji State University
Kevin Holm, LHB, Inc.
Shane Stennes, University of Minnesota
Mark Orlowski, Sustainable Endowments Institute

The creation of a successful Green Revolving Fund (GRF) has the potential to reduce environmental impact, save money, and break down silos through sustainable campus change. From fund creation to realized energy savings, a GRF engages faculty, staff, students, and community. Additionally, every fund created adds to a growing network of institutions which help to provide insight to current and future funds. In short, GRFs are becoming an increasingly large part of the broader sustainability movement.

Before an institution can begin lowering energy and resource use through sustainable projects, careful consideration of fund design is crucial. To get the most out of their funds, institutions want to maximize participation across the entire campus. Given the diversity of attitudes and concerns that exist on a campus, broad engagement can be challenging. Understanding the specific culture of each campus is essential, but below are some general strategies that can accommodate implementation of a successful GRF. I’ve also included some experiences we had utilizing these strategies.

Work Middle-Out
Traditional top-down or bottom-up strategies are ill-suited for GRFs. With a top-down strategy, the fund could be seen as a directive from administration, creating the perception that the fund is a traditional initiative coming down the institutional hierarchy, dropping into a sea of other administrative directives. A bottom-up strategy can be untenable to timely implementation as the diversity of opinions and concerns from many stakeholders may be an overwhelming task to sort through.

Instead, a more promising strategy lies with a “middle-out” approach, wherein change agents within spheres of influence both up and down the institutional hierarchy – administrative, faculty, staff, and student representatives – are brought on to design and manage the fund. These representatives further engage the campus in discussion of the fund, soliciting concerns and ideas. The goal is for the entire campus community to provide proposals, feedback, and support to ensure a successful fund can last in perpetuity. Targeting student government, staff committees, and the business office for representation provides broad reach for GRF implementation and eases the planning process.

Our experience bears this out. The bottom-up approach was inefficient at best, with low attendance at campus-wide presentations preventing expedient dissemination of the idea. Further, those who attended were supportive of most environmental initiatives, so not much influencing was needed. The top-down approach was averted for aforementioned reasons. After what felt like several months of languish, we implemented our middle-out approach. A GRF exploratory and planning committee was formed out of an existing sustainability committee with representatives of faculty, student, and staff. Adding the CFO, Special Assistant to the President, Physical plant director, and the Director of Sustainability, the committee was strategically positioned to move from fund design to project implementation quickly. Additionally, this allowed for many ideas and concerns to be brought to the committee. Instead of campus-wide presentations, the committee worked together to pitch the idea to all levels and areas of campus.

Go Beyond Financials
The financial appeal of a GRF is perhaps its greatest asset in building interest on campus, especially when building support from the business office. However, maintaining and increasing interest in the long run requires going beyond financial aspects and means you will need to provide specific benefits in other areas. Student and staff engagement, pedagogical opportunities, and enhancement of the commitment to sustainability are some of the many non-financial benefits of GRFs. Establishing non-financial goals thickens the argument for fund implementation and increases buy-in. Such goals should be reflected in both the mission of the fund and as benchmarks for success.

Our committee established some specific guidelines for projects that went beyond fast payback times. Projects will significantly raise the sustainability profile of the campus, so longer paybacks are acceptable when a project represents a fundamental change in energy use. Projects will be targeted that allow for community engagement, so use of local vendors and consultation represents a premium. Projects that improve upon existing master planning strategies and those which provide pedagogical opportunities are also highly prized. Finally, projects are required to be unanimously approved by the committee, giving each campus representative an opportunity to ensure their interests are being met.

Personalize and Market the GRF
While GRF adoption has been growing substantially, the concept is still relatively novel to the general population. This allows each institution to be on the leading edge of innovative sustainability practices. Since each will inevitably create their own specific version of a GRF, they become de facto innovators in their own right. This provides a great opportunity to market the funds. Creating a web presence, using public forums to solicit project ideas, and disseminating a fund’s purpose and goals can raise awareness on campus and in the community. To this end, a clear marketing strategy helps to provide legitimacy to a fund and the campus’ sustainability mission.

Our initial marketing campaign involved the creation, with the graphic design department, of a GRF logo which incorporated the college’s name, establishing a synergistic brand for both the school and fund. Numerous on-campus marketing campaigns were used to solicit initial and future project ideas, including email, social media, and the campus newspaper. In marketed school information, the GRF was placed front and center as a continuation and augmentation of our existing sustainability efforts. We’ve also used the GRF for advancement and donor opportunities.

A potentially innovative wrinkle we hope to add and market in the near future will be to consider carbon footprint reduction as an additional benefit beyond monetary savings, and to incorporate these into project cost-benefit analysis.

As public and private organizations continue to increase their focus on sustainable practices, promoting concepts such as GRFs to the broader public becomes a social good. Institutions can lead by example and show that investments in sustainability pay off in many different ways. GRF practitioners should go in with a developed strategy and an open mind. Connecting with other funds and organizations (like SEI) to discuss best practices is very important, but bringing the campus together around the fund is crucial. In the end, the success of a GRF will be determined by the commitment of its institution.

The AQ (Aquinas College) GRF was created in 2014 and saw its first completed projects in 2015. At the end of spring semester 2016, the AQ GRF had made more than $25,000 worth of sustainable investments on campus. These investments are expected to have a return of more than 25 percent and save more than $30,000 over five years in reduced energy costs. Projects have included retrofitting a solar panel, installing LED lights, and replacing older appliances. Learn more about the AQ GRF on their social media @AQGRF.