Everyone loves a good mystery. In the case of Bates College, it was a mysterious $2.5 million anonymous donation that helped expand its already successful sustainable dining program.
Bates College
Case Study
Bates College is a four-year independent liberal arts and sciences college in Lewiston, Maine. The college, founded in 1855, has nearly 2,000 students and more than 200 faculty members. Bates, like many colleges, believes that the environ-ment must be taken into consideration when purchasing, creating, delivering and serving food products. The college’s dining program integrates environmental stewardship into every decision regarding dining and food services.
At Bates, however, this commitment goes back nearly two decades, well before the current surge in attention to sustainability. Bates’ dining program already had many elements of a local, environ-mentally sensitive program in place, but the college decided to take its program to a new level in the 2008/2009 school year.
The college undertook a yearlong initiative to explore connections between the dining program, food and the educational mission of the college itself. The Nourishing Body and Mind: Bates Contemplates Food initiative was inspired by the opening of a new dining commons, and by the anonymous $2.5 million gift supporting the college’s use of foods that are organic, natural and farm fresh.
Bates Contemplates Food Initiative Has Two Objectives
The Bates Contemplates Food initiative—launched in September 2008 and formally concluded in June 2009—had two primary objectives:
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Add to the understanding and knowledge on campus, among students, staff and faculty, about food: about where its food comes from, about both the food system at Bates and the larger food system in which Bates is embedded. This goal included considering social issues such as dependence on petroleum and exploring diet-related diseases in the United States as well as celebrations of Maine products and farms.
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Build on, sustain and enhance what is already in place at Bates, both in practical ways (e.g., through Dining Services’ use of local products) and in the curriculum and co-curriculum.
The sustainable dining initiative has had an impact in four significant areas: Energy and water use; waste reduction; increased “Farm to Fork” purchasing of local and sustainable foods; and connecting campus dining to the curriculum and the broader mission of the college.
Reducing Water and Energy Usage through Multiple Initiatives
Bates College implemented several steps toward saving water and energy to support its program. These measures included installing “dual flush” toilets that provide half a flush (about .8 gallons) or full flush (about 1.6 gallons) compared to traditional toilets that use 2.9 gallons of water in a single flush.
Water-saving initiatives also included installing sensor-operated faucets, improving water retention and metering, planting water-efficient landscaping that requires no irrigation, and removing seven garbage disposals from the dining commons design, which saved approximately 1.4 million gallons of water per academic year and about $3,500 in electricity costs per year.
The college also made large strides in reducing its energy use, including designing the Dining Services Commons to use 20 percent less energy that is required by ASHRAE/IESNA Standard 90.1-1999.
The college employed natural ventilation for cooling instead of air conditioning; purchased ENERGY STAR® rated equipment such as hot and cold holding cabinets, warewasher, refrigeration components and computer equipment; installed lighting occupancy sensors; and switched to energy-efficient fluorescent bulbs.
The college’s Dining Services also uses an electric GEM vehicle as an alternative to the traditional gas-powered option. It is compact, roadworthy and runs on 100 percent renewable electricity.
Diverting 82 Percent of Waste from Landfill
Bates College’s dining program diverts more than 82 percent of its solid waste from the local landfill. The college accomplished this effort by recycling cardboard, glass, tin, plastic and mixed paper; using only paper products that are 92 percent compostable or recyclable; and adapting purchasing practices that focus on bulk and reusable packaging.
The college also participates in a pre-consumer food-waste-composting program established with a farm in Lisbon, Maine, and sends post-consumer food waste to a farmer in Poland, Maine, to be used as animal feed. Moreover, viable food items left over from meals are sent to two local food banks and account for about 33,000 meals for the community a year.
Additional waste-reduction initiatives include establishing relationships with vendors such as Stonyfield Farm, which collects and recycles its yogurt cups; collecting all used fryer oil, which is sold to a collection agent to make biodiesel; and instituting the Take-A-Mug-Leave-A-Mug program, which provides students with reusable lidded coffee mugs instead of paper cups for take-out drinks.
Because of its commitment to waste management, Bates Dining Services has realized a significant saving not only in the cost of waste removal but also in the cost of pest-control management. Prior to the start of this program, Dining Services was spending close to $40,000 on waste removal. This year the college spent $17,000. It saved an additional $2,000 in pest management related to the use of dumpsters.
Farm-to-Fork Program Expanded by 50 Percent
Dining Services has a long tradition of working with Maine producers to purchase healthy food options as close to the operation as possible, with a focus on decreasing its food shed and carbon footprint. When planning for the new dining commons began in 2006, Bates Dining Services was already purchasing over 14 percent of food supplies from local sources.
From May 2006 to August 2009, the college has doubled its local and farm-fresh purchasing from 14 percent to 28 percent. By September 2010 Bates expects this figure to rise to 30 percent. Additionally, Bates was able to increase its fair-trade coffee offering by 70 percent.
Examples of local purchasing practices include changing to a supplier in Harrison, Maine, that supplies spring water drawn from a naturally occurring spring rather than through an extraction process, as well as purchasing artisan bread baked from grain grown organically in the state.
The college purchases its dough balls for pizzas and 85 percent of its potatoes from local suppliers, as well as grass-fed beef from a ranch in New Portland, Maine.
Efforts Delivered Tremendous Results
The Bates Contemplates Food initiative has produced tremendous results for the college. There was no up-front cost to starting the program, beyond the initial convening of a campus-wide committee to develop plans for the initiative, and support from the school’s president’s office for a planning committee during the year.
The college saved more than $70,000 in water costs alone. Its waste-reduction strategies totaled $3,500. In addition, the college saved $7,500 by cutting back on paper products. It also saves $300 annually by using its electric GEM vehicle.
In total, Bates College saved $80,000 as a direct result of its sustainable dining program.
The Bates Contemplates Food initiative has delivered tangible results and has also helped to cement and highlight Bates' long commitment to a thoughtful, sustainable and nourishing approach to food on campus, making it something that is woven into the fabric of the institution and thereby more likely to remain in place for the long term.
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