COMMITMENT TO SUSTAINABILITY: A CASE STUDY OF GREEN ENERGY AND SUSTAINABILITY INITIATIVES AT AN AMERICAN UNIVERSITY
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.11113/jest.v7.153Keywords:
Sustainability, Environmental Education, Energy, Climate Action, PolicyAbstract
Research, teaching, and involvement at an American university in the areas of green energy and sustainability has placed it at the forefront of international leadership. Its campuses serve as living laboratories for the creation, testing, and implementation of ideas that solve some of the world's most difficult problems. However, very few literatures recorded the approaches made by American universities and most available information are either by European or Asian universities. Therefore, this article aims to provide an overview of the sustainability initiatives that are currently being carried out at this university using the qualitative case study method. We draw from interviews with the stakeholders, documents and observations to capture the information from collective viewpoints that is able to position the views aligned with the ongoing green energy and sustainability initiatives at this university. Some of the key components of this initiative include a realistic goal of Quadruple Bottom Line Sustainability Framework, University Radical Collaboration Priorities in Sustainability and Climate Action Plan. It was discovered from this study that many relatively prominent institutional assets, such as a living laboratory for sustainability and campus activities on wellbeing, played crucial roles in the process of getting the initiative off the ground. In this particular path of development, the initial physical assets have been transformed into complementary potential for research, teaching, and institutional growth. In spite of the fact that the case study is limited to a specific university in a particular geographic location, which makes it difficult to reproduce the findings, it does offer a fresh perspective on the topic of green energy and sustainability adoption by university through the interaction with the stakeholders.
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