|
Dynamic.RE and GreenLight Solutions engaged in a partnership for a fifth consecutive project cycle in the Spring of 2023. Dynamic.RE has ceaselessly tried to bring sustainability to the forefront of real estate endeavors through the creation of informational pamphlets outlining underlooked rebates, ebooks explaining ways for homeowners to better monetize their property whilst reducing their ecological footprint, and more. In particular, Dynamic.RE has sought innumerable ways to lessen the burden and stress associated with purchasing property in the United States’ economy. They have engaged in a two-semester long project—soon to extend beyond the Spring of 2023—to create a comprehensive database of sustainability programs, incentives, tools and companies for use by a diverse array of clients. Further adding to the breadth of this project, these individuals—namely: homeowners, fix-and-flip investors, buy-and-hold long term investors, and short term rental operators—hailed from numerous municipalities spanning the United States. The information coalesced within this directory is present in the public domain, however, by showcasing it all on a cohesive platform, the material becomes far more accessible. Our Project Team was tasked with expanding this database to a more extensive assortment of cities. We approached this goal in two strides: broad-online searches for available resources and interviews with utility company workers. We sought to procure 5 sustainable resources per city—of which there were 19—but ended up documenting 10, and we met our goal for interviewing 5 individuals per city—resulting in a total of 95 interviews and 190 general resources. A few sections of our team’s infographic that depicts our findings is presented below:
This information is now present on Dynamic.RE’s website where anyone involved in or seeking involvement in real estate may access it, allowing for their consumer-base to become more sustainable while saving thousands of dollars annually. In hopes of further enhancing the accessibility of these resources, Dynamic.RE and GreenLight have even begun the process of incorporating GIS mapping into their database. All of these modifications serve to bridge the gap between real estate and sustainability while relieving the fiscal and environmental concerns that come with buying, renting, or investing in a home.
Written By: Manasa Sreeram, a freshman attending Barrett the Honors College at Arizona State University in Tempe. She is working toward becoming an environmental lawyer. Her passions for the like are indicated by her concurrent major in political science and biological sciences with a concentration in conservation biology and ecology. The Spring of 2023 served as her first semester with GreenLight Solutions and she had the privilege of being a Project Lead for the Dynamic.RE team. She wishes to continue this engagement going forward and is eagerly studying GIS mapping for the coming Fall term.
0 Comments
In the Spring of 2023, we had the absolute pleasure of adding Green Education.US (GE.US) to our growing list of Project Partners. GE.US provides certifications, classes, and webinars in Sustainable Resource Management and asked for support in outreach to improve and market their program. The desired outcome included the identification of and outreach to a wide range of channels, as well as survey creation and distribution. Our small group of Solutioneers working with this Project Partner learned to create an impact through stakeholder outreach and communication, embodying the UN Sustainable Development Goal #17, Partnerships for the Goals.
Our first goal was to create a pool of data offering relevant information for sustainability professionals and students through survey creation and distribution. We made it a goal to create 2 different surveys for distribution, both with distinct scopes and purposes. This whole process consisted of reviewing post-program feedback surveys, brainstorming questions, distributing the surveys, and filtering through survey results to make note of relevant information. Despite this being a very lengthy process, we reached 100% of our goal by creating a student-aimed survey as well as an employer-aimed survey. The student survey gathered feedback on GE.US programs and websites and was marketed towards students studying anything related to sustainability including environmental sciences, urban planning, sustainable agriculture, and more. This survey essentially explored what students liked or didn’t like about GE.US programs and what obstacles stopped them from enrolling in a GE.US program. On the other hand, the employer survey was marketed towards current sustainability employers with the end goal of informing students interested in a career in sustainability on what it is that employers look for in potential employees straight out of college. The results of these surveys were translated into a document for GE.US to use moving forward towards the improvement of their business. Our second objective was to collaborate with organizations with a pre-existing social media presence to promote our surveys and other GE.US educational program offerings. We made it a goal to be featured by 4 platforms on behalf of external organizations to GE.US. We surpassed this goal as we were featured by 6 organizations across Slack channels, Instagram posts and stories, and LinkedIn posts. This was all done through communications with other organizations where we marketed what we had to offer to them in exchange for their promotion of our content. We were granted access into the student perspective of GE.US programs in order to gain first-hand views of what it truly was that we were marketing. These collaborations also had the intention of gaining us more survey responses and interactions which they were successful in. Although the processes leading up to the overall success of the project were not always quick and easy, we were able to explore different aspects of project management which was facilitated by the many resources and great feedback offered by our Project Partner. Green Education.US now has a strong starting point for any future projects in collaboration with GreenLight Solutions. This will allow them to further explore the current state of the sustainability industry and reach larger and more widely known organizations, hopefully reaching global connections and collaborations. Written By: Yasmin Calderon Feliciano and Jane Hill. As of the Spring of 2023, Yasmin Calderon Feliciano has been working with GreenLight Solutions for over a year and a half. She graduated from Mesa Community College in May 2023 with an Associate’s in Sustainability and will continue to work towards her Bachelor’s at Arizona State University in the Fall. She is passionate about environmental justice BIPOC communities across the world and loves expanding on the education accessible to all regarding the current environmental state of the world. Jane Hill is a senior at Arizona State University and will be graduating Spring 2024 with a Bachelors of Science in Biological Sciences: Conservation Biology and Ecology. She is passionate about educating others on how to protect the environment by implementing sustainable practices and conserving natural resources. GreenLight Solutions has given Jane the opportunity to network with sustainability professionals and students while educating others about how to positively impact the environment. There is no better way to celebrate Earth Day than to divert waste from the landfill. For their Earth Day Celebration at Maya’s Farm in Phoenix, FOR Energy partnered with Green Events Services to provide waste, recycling, and composting services for over 150 attendees. Keep Phoenix Beautiful helped our team coordinate the waste and recycling bins, while Recycled City handled the compost bins. The event consisted of a farmer’s market, petting zoo, food and drink, and a sustainable cooking demonstration with Chef Elizabeth Mienz. We led our Green Team to bin guard at several waste stations set up throughout the area, instructing event-goers on proper disposal etiquette. Additionally, because of the event’s smaller size, we were able to interact more with the attendees, and took great pride in educating them about the importance of recycling and composting. For example, we let people know that typically over 50% of municipal waste is actually compostable. Hopefully, some people were inspired by our efforts and will start composting more on their own. The Green Team ended up achieving a 68% waste diversion rate by generating more compost and recyclables than waste. Our efforts complemented the overarching mission of the farm, which uses no pesticides, herbicides, or commercial fertilizers to grow their organic produce. We look forward to future events with both FOR Energy and Maya’s Farm as we continue to grow and find ways to make the local community more sustainable.
Our Partners:
FOR Energy: FOR Energy specializes in residential solar energy systems, helping homeowners enjoy free energy while helping the environment. They offer residential free consultations in Phoenix, AZ, to provide individuals with valuable information about solar panel systems and how they can benefit. Maya’s Farm: Maya’s Farm is a small, sustainable operation which produces high-quality specialty vegetables, herbs, flowers and eggs for local markets, restaurants and schools. A community-supported agriculture (CSA) program gives subscribers a weekly supply of produce that is cut by hand in the field daily. Keep Phx Beautiful: Founded in 1982, Keep Phoenix Beautiful is a local, sustainably-minded non-profit 501(c)3 organization that aims to empower diverse communities to improve their overall quality of life. They host numerous events every year that focus on recycling, composting, and greening local landscapes. Recycled City: Recycled City is a full-circle service in the Phoenix Valley that makes it easy to turn your food waste back into farmland. They are returning nutrients to the soil and using it to grow fresh, local, chemical-free produce. The Green Team: Ashley Weisman Bryce Campbell Gemini Boudrie Jessica Simon Author: Bryce Campbell Bryce Campbell is a senior at Arizona State pursuing a degree in business and a minor in sustainability. Outside of GreenLight, he is a Renewable Energy Intern for Seaside Sustainability, focusing on analyzing state programs concerning the transition to cleaner energy. He enjoys finding ways to leave an impact on his local community and likes to play guitar and cook in his free time. Celebrate Mesa is an annual, family fun style festival for the local community with music, vendors, and food. Roughly 15 food trucks are at the event every year, however, composting had never been done before. All the food waste had been previously thrown away and sent to the landfill. There, food decomposes under anaerobic conditions and produces methane, a potent greenhouse gas that has approximately 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide. Composting, on the other hand, is the perfect way to help mother nature recycle. The aerobic process of composting does not produce methane because methane-producing microbes are not active in the presence of oxygen. Celebrate Mesa, which is run by the City of Mesa, wanted to increase the sustainability of their event, which led them to reach out to Green Events Services to provide composting services for their 6,000 attendees. We recruited 4 volunteers from GreenLight Solutions to help us compost at this event. The so-called “Green Team” was mainly responsible for bin guarding and making sure attendees knew exactly which bin to place their food scraps in. The team was also responsible for sorting the bins, as needed, to make sure what went in the bins was correct. Bin contamination can lead to the bins being completely rejected at the composting site, which would have wasted the efforts of our volunteers. However, the team was properly trained in knowing what could be recycled, and were successful in their bin guarding efforts. By the end of the event, the Green Team was able to divert 120 pounds of compost, which, in terms of emissions, is equivalent to 93 miles driven by an average four-door sedan. The compost was then distributed to our partner, Recycled City, a local small business that has the resources to properly carry out the full composting process. Every year, U.S. food loss and waste embodies 170 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions, which is equivalent to 42 coal power plants. We must lower these emissions if we are to reduce Earth’s rate of warming, and composting is one solution. Green Events Services is looking forward to serving Celebrate Mesa’s needs in 2024, and providing composting services at other events as well!
Our Partners: City of Mesa: We partnered with the City of Mesa, who was organizing the whole event. They coordinated the vendors and music, as well as the waste and recycling services through their Mesa Recycles program. Recycled City: Recycled City is a full-circle service in the Phoenix Valley that makes it easy to turn your food waste back into farmland. They are returning nutrients to the soil and using it to grow fresh, local, chemical-free produce. The Green Team: Ashley Weisman Bryce Campbell Chiara Moore Gemini Boudrie Author: Bryce Campbell Bryce Campbell is a senior at Arizona State pursuing a degree in business and a minor in sustainability. Outside of GreenLight, he is a Renewable Energy Intern for Seaside Sustainability, focusing on analyzing state programs concerning the transition to cleaner energy. He enjoys finding ways to leave an impact on his local community and likes to play guitar and cook in his free time. |
Archives
July 2024
Categories |
RSS Feed
|
RECEIVE GREENLIGHT NEWS
|
© GreenLight Solutions. All rights reserved.
|