Starting this fall, UF will ask Gators to evaluate how green they are, starting with the College of Design, Construction and Planning.
The Office of Sustainability and the college are implementing the Green Audit, which calls for changes in energy, waste, water and food consumption.
The audit consists of a checklist that students, faculty and staff at the college will be asked to fill out. They will record the amount of energy, water, waste and food they conserved. Each category will be compared.
“It’s a way to engage the staff to get the baseline data on their level of sustainability,” said Michael Amish, program assistant for the Office of Sustainability.
The data will be used to determine what the college needs to focus on conserving.
The goal is for the audit to be used in other colleges around campus in upcoming years and to conserve more of everything, Amish said.
The office hopes that by gathering this information, UF will be more likely to attain its goal of zero waste by 2015.
The office will perform audits more frequently and throughout campus after the first one is recorded, Amish said.
Green Team Leaders, who are faculty members helping the Office of Sustainability, will be revising the audit for the next few weeks, Amish said.
The audit was funded by Progress Energy, a power company that recently awarded the office and the College of Design, Construction and Planning with a grant.
Robert Ries, interim director of the Rinker School of Building Construction, hopes the Green Audit will show students and faculty that saving energy and resources is cost-effective and attainable.
“We want to generally show people how easy it is, inspire people to incorporate it into their lives,” he said.
