Sustainability Action Plan
What does a sustainable Pomona look like? What will it take to get there? How long will it take to get there? How much will it cost?
These questions, along with many others, are guiding the creation of Pomona College's first-ever Sustainability Action Plan. When this plan is complete, it will serve to guide the College toward sustainability goals, complete with targets to meet, a timeline for implementation, and an exploration of funding sources.
Stay tuned to this page for more information!
The Purpose
The creation of the Action Plan is due in part to our membership in the Presidents Climate Commitment, a national membership organization for colleges and universities that requires a "climate action plan" be completed by a certain date after signing on to the agreement. Pomona College's climate action plan was due September 15, 2009 and can be found here.
Pomona, however, is committed to producing a full sustainability action plan, focusing on much more than just climate issues. The wide array of sustainability topics (e.g. energy, water, environmental justice), are categorized into goal areas. As of right now, the goal areas we are working with include:
- Reduced greenhouse gas emissions
- Reduced resource impact
- Reduced air, water, and soil pollution and toxins
- Increased environmental health for all members of the community
- Sustainable sustainability
- Public commitment to sustainability
The Content
For each of the goals, the plan will include answers to the following questions:
- What are we currently doing in this goal area?
- What do we currently know about our impacts in this goal area?
- How do we measure progress in this goal area?
- Who is responsible for measuring progress?
- What is our target for this measure?
- What do we need to do to reach this target? How effective will those things be?
- How much will it cost to do what we need to do? Where will the money come from?
- Who is responsible for following through with what we need to do?
- What are the barriers keeping us from doing what we need to do?
- When are we going to do these things?
The Process
The Sustainability Action Plan process requires the input from the entire campus community. Input from students, staff, faculty, trustees, alumni, and all others will be incredibly important to the creation of a Plan that is supported by all and can eventually be successfully fulfilled.
The Plan process is lead by the Sustainability Integration Office, the President's Advisory Committee on Sustainability, the Board of Trustees Sustainability Task Force, and the Environmental Quality Committee to gather input, conduct research, and gather content for the plan.
Sustainability Action Fellowship Program
An important part of the process is the creation of the Sustainability Action Fellowship Program, a group of 29 students who worked throughout the 2008-09 school year to take the lead in conducting research, interviewing appropriate staff and faculty members, analyzing input from the campus community, and compiling lists of possible strategies and actions for Pomona to take.