Accomplishments

General | Dental School Dean’s Office | Environmental Health and Safety
Facilities Management | Information Management and Services | Library | Medical School
Police Department | Printing Services | Regional Academic Health Center in Harlingen

A variety of projects are already underway at UT Health Science Center. These projects include:

General

• The new South Texas Research Facility, currently in the early construction stages, has been redesigned according to the US Green Building Council Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) New Construction standards as a base for best-practices.
• The new Medical Arts and Research Center (MARC), currently nearing completion, has been reviewed by architects to yield additional energy saving changes that can be implemented to the design at the current phase of work.
• The SGA started the first campus-wide recycling program in conjunction with Wise-Guys recycling a few years ago. Recently, the Green Initiative Committee, with support from the office of the President, added 15 new multi-use recycling bins around campus (click here for a map of recycling bin locations). Recycling for paper, cans, and bottles are available in these bins across campus. For data on the amount of recycling and waste on campus, please click here.

 

Dental School Dean’s Office    [website]

• Will be consulting with IMS to enable sleep mode on all computers and monitors in the office.
• Will include energy efficiency as an important factor when purchasing equipment for the office and labs.
• Will use recycled paper for office use.
• Will double-side all copies and print jobs whenever possible.

 

Environmental Health and Safety     [website]

• 2008 Practice Greenhealth Environmental Leadership Circle Award
• 2007 Hospitals for a Healthy Environment Leadership Award
• UT Health Science Center at San Antonio awarded State of Texas Environmental Excellence Award
• UT Health Science Center at San Antonio awarded San Antonio Water System (SAWS) Environmental Excellence Award
• UT Health Science Center at San Antonio recognized as a TCEQ Clean Texas, Cleaner World Partner
• UT Health Science Center at San Antonio awarded the Hospitals for a Healthy Environment (H2E) Partner for Change Award
• Environmental Health and Safety, in conjunction with the Dental School, installed one of the first mercury capture systems in any dental clinic in the country. This system enables mercury to be removed from waste generated in dental clinics before it goes into the public waste system.
• EHS has instituted a system by which labs can exchange excess chemical supplies rather than dispose of them. Please visit the ‘Chemical Exchange Program.’

 

Facilities Management     [website]

• Since 2005, landscape irrigation at UT Health Science Center at San Antonio has been supplied by recycled water. This clean, but non-potable water, is provided by a special water pipe from SAWS. Since 2007, nearly 34 million gallons of recycled water have been used.
• A large number of landscape areas have been xeriscaped to decrease water requirements. Insert picture of xeriscaped beds.
• Housekeepers are currently in the process of Green Cleaning certification.
• 80% of all cleaning products used on campus by facilities are green certified.
• 65% of the paper used by facilities is recycled paper.
• Facilities recycles all metal from renovations and maintenance
• Facilities purchased and utilizes the University’s first Toyota Prius Hybrid vehicle for both on-campus activities and for commuting between campuses.
• Facilities is replacing old gasoline service carts with Green electric-carts
• 13 trees from N. Campus were salvaged during construction and will be replanted on the main campus.
• The Nursing School Courtyard renovation will include xeriscaping and drip irrigation instead of the traditional sprinkler systems.

 

Information Management and Services     [website]

• Currently configuring all public-space University computers to go to sleep/hibernate mode if not in use.
• Currently updating network switches, servers, and classroom data projectors with desktops achieving a 25% decrease in energy use, servers achieving 80% energy reduction, network switches that are 20% more energy-efficient.
• Currently reconfiguring the data center with hot and cold isles, high density rack cabinets, and other energy efficiency steps.

 

Library     [website]

• Library staff have provided paper-recycling in the library for several years.
• The library is in the progress of changing the default printing status to ‘double-sided’.
• The library has put together a ‘Green Team’ to identify and implement green practices in the Health Science Center Library.

 

Medical School    [website]

• Effective in the fall of 2009, all syllabi in the medical school will be printed double-sided, saving over 1 million pieces of paper every two years.

 

Printing Services

• Effective as of March, 2009, printing prices have been changed to provide an incentive to print double-sided. Printing projects double-sided will cost departments significantly less than single-sided printing.

 

Police Department    [website]

• The campus police department will work on a plan to phase-out a significant number of its police-cruiser use. Officers will increase foot patrols and bike patrols, which has the added benefit of improving campus security.

 

Regional Academic Health Center in Harlingen    [website]

• The Regional Academic Health Center has secured two large recycling bins (one for paper and one for cardboard) from the city of Harlingen, and is moving forward with plans to increase recycling across campus.
• The library at the Regional Academic Health Center has been recycling newspaper, paper, and aluminum since it opened in 2002.

 

Is a major Green accomplishment missing from this list? If so, please use our Comments page to alert us so we can spread the word!

Recycling on campus is available at the following locations:

Paper, Plastic, and Metal Sorted Bins (Gray)

• AAB Building 1st floor near classrooms
• CTRC Building Lobby
• Dental Building 1st Floor near Entrance to Texas Star Café
• Dental Building 4th Floor near Dental Dean’s Office
• Dolph Briscoe Jr. Library Lobby
• GCCRI Lobby
• Health Professions Building Lobby
• Lecture Hall Building Outside MSI lecture hall
• Lecture Hall Building Outside MSII lecture hall
• Medical School Outside 310L
• Medical School Outside 410L
• McDermott Building Main entrance
• Nursing Building Lobby
• Parman Auditorium Foyer

Plastic and Metal Combined Bins (Green or Blue)

• AAB Building Academic Affairs kitchen area
• Dolph Briscoe Jr. Library 3rd floor near copiers (2)
• Dolph Briscoe Jr. Library 4th floor near elevator
• Dolph Briscoe Jr. Library 5th floor near elevator
• Garage A
• Garage B
• Health Professions Building Student lounge (1.108)
• Lecture Hall Building 2nd floor, near student lounge
• Lecture Hall Building 3rd floor bridge to Medical School
• Medical School Outside 210L
• Medical School Medical Dean’s Office
• Medical School 3rd floor near walkway to UH
• Medical School Graduate Dean’s Office
• Nursing Building 1st floor, outside Auditorium
• Nursing Building Outside 1.463

Recycling and Waste Numbers

	Aluminum cans	Paper	Plastic bottles	Scrap metal	Trash	Water
January '09						611,946 gal
February '09	62 lbs	6,340 lbs	46 lbs	13,106 lbs		1,550,063 gal
March '09	9 lbs		44 lbs	7553 lbs

Recycling and Waste Numbers from 2008
Batteries:	7600 lbs
Cardboard and paper	210,140 lbs
Fluorescent lamps	5000 lbs
X-ray film	1200 lbs
Solvents	6400 lbs
Photo fixer	6000 lbs