By Caroline Nickolaus
Staff Writer
The Sustainability Committee at LIU Post may not be that well-known or talked about as of yet, but the goals and advancements that the organization has planned for the future are quite profound.
Founded by Dr. Scott Carlin in the spring of 2010, the Sustainability Committee strives to encourage students, faculty, and administrators to lead more sustainable lives. “Sustainability is about maintaining the qualities of the natural world that we value: clean air and water, biodiversity, and a functioning climate system,” Dr. Carlin said.
Some of the ways in which members of the campus community have taken up sustainability efforts is by using reusable water bottles, which means less waste, and by “printing double sided [assignments] only when necessary, which saves energy and resources, as well as conserves renewable energy in the form of solar panels and geothermal heat,” said Sarah Pomerenke, the committee’s coordinator.
“Sustainability is a way to live life, basically caring for future generations who will also live on this planet,” Pomerenke continued. “[O]ur current economy is set up [in a way] that we are using more stuff than nature can replenish. We are taking more oil out of the ground than nature can produce, we are using our clean water faster than nature can purify the dirty water, we are polluting the air faster than plants can clean the air, [and] we are cutting down trees faster than they can grow. Basically, we are depleting natural resources; we are living unsustainabl[y].”
The school’s website offers their definition of sustainability: “[It] is about drawing upon our campus community’s diverse strengths and talents to promote our vision of a healthy, beautiful, efficient, and just planet. Through special lectures, energy conservation, tree replacement programs, recycling, community workshops, and other initiatives, we work to ensure that our natural systems are healthy and can meet our needs as well as [the needs of] future generations.”
For those seriously interested in sustainability, there is a minor program to enroll in at LIU Post. If you are interested in making the campus a more sustainable one, you can start by avoiding printing paper whenever possible, and reusing water bottles.
To get involved, you can attend the committee’s next meeting on Monday, Dec. 8, in Hillwood room 218. The website is http://www.liu.edu/post/green, and there is a blog led by another committee coordinator, William Achnitz, which can be found at http://liucommpost.com.
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