UTM Ecological Footprint Analysis Progress Report, 28 July 2004

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO at MISSISSAUGA

GROW SMART, GROW GREEN

University of Toronto at Mississauga

Ecological Footprint Analysis

17 May – 28 July 2004 Progress Report

Source: Citizens for a Sustainable Community, 2004

Prepared by Gregory Bunker under the supervision of Professor Tenley Conway.

Funded by the Office of the Chief Administrative Officer at UTM.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Executive summary 3

Part I: Introduction

An introduction to ecological footprint analysis 5

Expectations of UTM’s ecological footprint analysis 6

Part II: Methodology

Methodology 7

The Calculators 7

Part III: Results

UTM’s HEFC ecological footprint 10

UTM’s SEFC ecological footprint 12

Part IV: Recommendations

Reducing UTM’s footprint 13

Future footprint studies at UTM 14

Part V: References 16

Part VI: Appendices

Appendix A: HEFC Breakdown 17

Household Ecological Footprint Calculator

Notes on the HEFC indicators

Appendix B: SEFC Breakdown 20

School Ecological Footprint Calculator

Notes on the SEFC indicators

Appendix C: Contributors and Contacts 22

Contributors and contact information

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Purpose

An ecological footprint measures as many facets of consumption of an entity as possible converting it into an equivalent areal unit of biologically productive land and water required to sustain consumption for one year. The ecological footprint analysis (EFA) conducted at UTM over the summer of 2004 was not meant to be a comprehensive assessment, but designed to gauge the data available for such a study and explore the value of an EFA to UTM.

The footprints produced from EFA calculations were expected to be large and in the long term unsustainable. This can be expected of a university, where many large buildings, food services, transportation and other consumptive demands are made by a dense and active community. The purpose of the EFA, then, is to clearly and constructively direct UTM towards more efficient, sustainable consumption, not to criticize its current resource use.

Methodology

Two EFA calculators were used to determine UTM’s ecological footprint: a very detailed EFA calculator (Household Ecological Footprint Calculator [HEFC]) and a second, simpler calculator (School Ecological Footprint Calculator [SEFC]). The majority of data collected for both calculators are from January 2002 through July 2004 administrative records. Each calculator tabulates data using indicators organized under common categories. For example, the amount of vegetables, potatoes and fruit consumed per month is an indicator in the food category, while the kilometers traveled per month on transit buses is an indicator under the transportation heading. All data collected were documented in an electronic database.

Results

The size of UTM’s footprint is substantial. Ranging from 40,560 hectares (HEFC) to 49,149 hectares (SEFC), it is nearly twice the total area of the City of Mississauga (28,750 hectares). Provided that some indicators were unaccounted for and others are conservative estimates, UTM’s complete footprint would likely exceed these thresholds. As is, this footprint represents between 6.9 (HEFC) and 8.3 (SEFC) hectares per full-time equivalent student, or about the area of all of the parking lots on UTM combined, per student! If faculty and staff are also included, the footprint lies between 6.3 (HEFC) and 7.6 (SEFC) hectares per person. Since UTM’s campus totals 90.2 hectares, UTM requires an area at least 450 times its own size to sustain its current activity.

Recommendations to reduce UTM’s footprint

Decreasing UTM’s reliance on fossil fuel consumption, cropland, consumed land, and biodiversity land will maximize a reduction in UTM’s footprint and enable progress towards a more sustainable campus.

The following recommendations are based on the primary factors contributing to UTM’s footprint:

1. Continued development of new, on-campus sources of energy to help reduce UTM’s dependence on fossil fuel energy.

2. New buildings built to LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design)

standards.

3. Continued support of the hybrid shuttle bus and the purchase of additional hybrid busses.

4. Using motion-sensor lights in classrooms and other appropriate areas.

5. Conducting awareness campaigns.

6. Developing a materials exchange program within the university.

7. Investing in additional recycling receptacles.

8. Increasing ecolabeling.

9. Replacing paper towels with air-jet hand dryers.

Recommendations for future footprint studies at UTM

It is recommended that a new calculator be developed that can better handle the specific consumption patterns of UTM. Input categories should be aligned with departments at UTM (i.e. “Business Services,” “Facility Resources,” and “Residence”). Likewise, indicators should be defined cooperatively between the calculator developers and UTM departments to ensure necessary data will be available for analysis. This approach would encourage transparency and reduces the time required to collect data, enabling a more in-depth analysis. The results of repeat analyses using this approach would be understandable, applicable, and instructive to the entire UTM community. The development of a new calculator, in addition to the data required of it, can also provide project opportunities for interested students at many levels of study.

PART I: INTRODUCTION

An introduction to ecological footprint analysis

Figure 1. What is an ecological footprint? Think of a school as having an “industrial metabolism.” In this respect, it can be compared to a large animal grazing in its pasture. Just like the beast, the school consumes resources and all this energy and matter eventually passes through to the environment again. Thus, the footprint question becomes: “How large a pasture is necessary to support that school indefinitely—to produce all its ‘feed’ and to assimilate all its wastes sustainably?” Source: Wackernagel and Rees, 1996.

The ecological footprint analysis (EFA) concept was developed by Mathis Wackernagel and William E. Rees (1996) to accurately represent the natural resource consumption of human activities. The idea is to measure as many facets of consumption of an entity as possible and convert this consumption into an equivalent areal unit of biologically productive land and water required to sustain consumption for a year: an ecological footprint.

EFA studies have been conducted for countries, cities and more recently, institutions such as universities (Venetoulis, Chazan, Gaudet, 2004; Venetoulis, 2000; Venetoulis, 2001). Canadians have been calculated to consume 7.8 hectares per capita, while Americans use 10.4 hectares per person; each Torontonian consumes 7.6 hectares (Onisto et al, 1998), and the typical Santa Monican consumes 8.5 hectares of resources per year (Venetoulis, 2000). Unfortunately, no university footprint studies have been found in a complete enough state for comparison to this project, but methodologies used at other schools have been instructive (Venetoulis, 2001). Globally, the current sustainable amount of earth’s surface area per global citizen is 2 hectares (Onisto et al, 1998). If the world’s population lived up to Canadian consumption rates, the resources of three planet Earths would be necessary to sustain us (Wackernagel and Rees, 1996)! The ability to simply and clearly communicate consumption using simple area measures is a major strength of EFA (Moffat, 2000).

Some limitations of the EFA are that it is a static analysis and it makes no recommendations outside of including more land, decreasing the population or decreasing consumption per person. The EFA does not consider fundamentally unsustainable practices in its calculations, such as toxic waste production, since the products of these activities cannot be assimilated by nature. Thus, the EFA is by its nature a conservative measure of resource consumption. However, the EFA is a diagnostic tool capable of highlighting areas of relatively high consumption, raising awareness and serving as a guide to resource sustainability in policymaking.

Expectations of UTM’s ecological footprint analysis

The EFA conducted over the summer of 2004 at UTM was not expected to be a comprehensive assessment but designed to gauge the data available for such a study and explore the value an EFA may offer UTM. Initially, a single detailed EFA calculator (Household Ecological Footprint Calculator [HEFC]; Redefining Progress, 2003) was considered for the project. A second, simpler calculator (School Ecological Footprint Calculator [SEFC]; Redefining Progress and the Victoria EPA, 2003) was later adopted in the hopes that a basic but more easily completed rendition of resource use at UTM could be compared to the less complete, but more exhaustive, household calculator.

The footprint sizes produced from both calculations were expected to be large and in the long term, unsustainable. This can be expected of an institution such as a university, where many large buildings, food services, transportation and other consumptive demands are made by a dense and active community. The purpose of the EFA, then, is to clearly and constructively direct UTM towards becoming a more efficient, sustainable campus, not criticize its current state of resource use.

PART II: METHODOLOGY

Methodology

The EFA conducted at UTM over the summer of 2004 was prepared by Gregory Bunker, a part-time research assistant working alongside Chelsea Stewart, a research assistant completing a campus sustainability assessment. The project was supervised by Tenley Conway, a professor of the Geography Department, and funded by the Office of the Chief Administrative Officer at UTM. One-hundred-forty-five hours were funded for the completion of this project.

The majority of data collected were from administrative records and many are estimates ranging from January 2002 to July 2004. Each calculator tabulated the data collected using distinct indicators organized under common categories. For example, the amount of vegetables, potatoes and fruit consumed per month is an indicator under the food category, as the kilometers traveled per month on transit buses is an indicator under the transportation heading. The division of international and domestic postage (an indicator concerning the HEFC), the expected life of buildings in years and paper used for note-taking (indicators concerning the SEFC) were determined through reasonable inferences. The remaining indicators were based on data provided by UTM staff and administration and are assumed to be representative of resource use at UTM. All data collected is documented in an electronic database complete with appropriate notes.

Suitable indicators of resource consumption at a university are necessary to help determine whether UTM is moving toward, or away, from a sustainable future. Indicators must capture economic, environmental and social aspects of sustainable development (Moffat, 2000), and be accurately interpreted and calculated to relay an indicator’s status alone and within the context of the EFA calculation. The EFA calculators utilized in this study are outlined below, highlighting specific differences in indicator accountability.

The Calculators

The EFA conducted at UTM over the summer of 2004 used two frameworks: the Household Ecological Footprint Calculator v. 3.2 (HEFC) and the School Ecological Footprint Calculator (SEFC). The former was developed by Redefining Progress and the latter is a joint creation of Redefining Progress and the Environmental Protection Agency of Victoria, Australia. Redefining Progress is an organization that “works with partners to change technology, influence the choices individuals make, and resolve pressing social and environmental issues.” (Redefining Progress, 2004) A basic schematic of how an ecological footprint calculator works is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2. A basic schematic of a two-category EFA calculation and resource use distribution based on the HEFC calculator. The SEFC operates similarly, differing in how resource use distribution (the bottom six categories) is defined.

The HEFC

The HEFC is exhaustive and attuned to typical household consumption patterns. It consists of 79 indicators divided into six categories: food, housing, transportation, goods, services, and waste. The footprint provided by this calculator can be extremely accurate for a university, however, collecting the appropriate data in the requested units (predominately in weight consumed per month) at the scale of a university is difficult, and in certain cases, unrealistic. An example includes establishing the weight of wood used in the construction of buildings on campus, which is a nearly impossible indicator to ascertain. The benefit of using this calculator is that, with enough data, areas of high consumption are realized and appropriate action can be facilitated to reduce the footprint in the most specific and effective way. The results of the HEFC are detailed in Appendix A.

The SEFC

The SEFC is far less comprehensive than the HEFC, constructed specifically for the school environment using data that can be reasonably and readily attained. It consists of 28 indicators divided into five categories: school buildings, food, travel, goods, and recycling and waste. The benefit of using this calculator is data collection is minimal but generally creates a representative footprint of the school’s consumption. The results of the SEFC are detailed in Appendix B.

The HEFC and SEFC taken together

HEFC
/ SEFC
Number of indicators:
/ 79 / 28
Categories:
/ 1 Food / 1 Food
2 Housing / 2 School Buildings
3 Transportation / 3 Travel
4 Goods / 4 Goods
5 Services
6 Waste / 5 Recycling and Waste
Resource Use Types:
/ 1 Fossil Energy / 1 Energy Land
2 Cropland / 2 Cropland
3 Pasture / 3 Pasture
4 Forest / 4 Forest Land
5 Built-up Land / 5 Consumed Land
6 Fisheries / 6 Biodiversity

Table 1. A comparison of how each calculator categorizes indicators and defines ecological footprint distribution among resource use types.

The footprint calculated from the SEFC is less diagnostic than the HEFC when comparing the number of indicators in each (Table 1), but for the purposes of this study serves as a benchmark for comparison and future research. This is necessary because the completion of the HEFC was not expected over the 2004 summer term. In the long-term, the comprehensiveness of the HEFC is essential in assessing UTM’s resource consumption patterns. In the short-term, the SEFC provides a quick breakdown of UTM’s footprint and meaningful year-to-year comparisons of broad changes in UTM’s resource consumption patterns. In both cases, only the impacts of on-campus activities were considered (resource consumption by faculty, staff, and students), while off-campus activities related to the university were not considered in the calculations.

PART III: RESULTS

Figure 3. Living in a terrarium. How big would the glass hemisphere need to be so that the school under it could sustain itself exclusively on the ecosystems contained? Source: Wackernagel and Rees, 1996.

Results of the HEFC

As suggested above, a critical consideration in assessing UTM’s footprint is how the indicators are individually calculated. A primary illustration is transportation in the HEFC. If the St. George shuttle bus is defined as an intercity bus, fossil fuel consumption is calculated to be equal to the number of passengers multiplied by the number of kilometers traveled per month. This calculation is not an effective diagnostic tool for resource use at an institution, and its effectiveness as an indicator is lost in this way. Increasing the number of students using this mode of mass transportation would actually increase UTM’s footprint, and any improvement in the fuel efficiency of the service is not considered. This is counterintuitive, and when the shuttle bus figures are equated to car use in the car indicator of the HEFC, the footprint of UTM is reduced a full 50% from 80,670 hectares to 40,560 hectares. Defining the shuttle bus as a car in the HEFC also allows any improvements in fuel efficiency to be adjusted for in future calculations.