Greening the Conference...

So, here’s the thing. We planned a conference for 30 people, but put it at a bad time of year, right before school starts. So we won’t do that again. Still, we have about 10 people coming, to find out from us how to do production for a small planetarium. While they are here, I feel sort of responsible for their footprint, since I am making lots of their decisions for them. So, I’m trying to be a little thoughtful and creative where I can. Here are some examples...

1) Our water in our building is terrible. Seriously. It’s often brown, usually smells funny, and some people say it makes them sick. For those of us that ‘live’ there, there are two options, and we use them both: we have a filter connected in the faculty office hallway; and over in the planetarium, we have bottled water delivered in those big, blue, 5-gallon, reusable kegs. So here comes the conference, and catering services wants to sell me water for my guests. In little tiny bottles. Like several of them per day, per person. In my head, I look from the conference person (who’s actually on the phone!), to the water dispenser (which is actually in a whole other building), and I think, I have a better idea. So I called the Public Relations people, and they donated the re-usable plastic water bottles that are branded with the University name! Ok, so there is still the pthalate and bpa worry, but at least it’s only one bottle per person for the whole week, instead of several per day! A huge improvement, footprint-wise. Why don’t I just have them use the filter? It’s slow and expensive, compared to the water cooler. Also, we are behind on our water usage from the summer slowdown, and have several of the jugs just sitting there, waiting to be used!

2) Interestingly, catering services offers china and silver instead of paper and plastic, if you ask. This was even at no extra cost. So we will be minimizing trash at snacks and lunch!

3) Originally, I had planned to just have everyone get to campus from the hotel however they chose. But then I realized that that would be a huge pain. I’d have to worry about parking passes, and all these people would be going the same way at the same time but not sharing, and there’s all this construction on campus... Anyway, I decided to rent a University shuttle bus to take people back and forth to the hotel. But then only 10 people signed up, and here I was paying many, many hundreds of dollars for a shuttle bus and driver. So, given my car-free challenge experience, I thought, ‘I have a better idea’. So I went off to the Smith’s, and got everyone bus tokens and maps for the 603. It picks them up a block from the hotel, and drops them off right outside the door of our building. This little brainstorm saved me nearly $700. I don’t know what’s going to happen when the charge shows up on my University credit card, but I’ll think about that tomorrow...

4) We had also planned to use a different shuttle bus to get everyone down to the Clark Planetarium one evening, to see a show, and then get dinner in SLC. AHA! Front Runner to the rescue! By the time I send these people home, they are going to be so jealous of our public transportation, they’re going to want to move here!

5) The only event that we couldn’t get to by public transportation is a star party on Antelope Island. I’m the speaker, as if there wasn’t enough going on, and I thought it would be fun for everyone to go. But no buses go out there, and even if they did, it would be at the wrong time. So I rented a mini-bus from motor pool, to drive them all out there and back. My driving of the mini-bus should be an exciting addition to the already over-loaded schedule! Maybe it will rain... just kidding... sort of... ; ) At least we will all be together in the ‘ultimate’ carpool, instead of heading out in 12 separate cars!

So I’m working on it. Maybe the next big thing is the virtual conference, but somehow, I don’t think so. We are social animals, and chatting by computer is just not the same.