By Grace Welsh —
The University of Louisville Sustainability Council has teamed up with Recyclemania to engage students and faculty in a competition between 141 North American universities to promote eco-conscious lifestyles.
The event, known as Ecolympics 2020, will happen from Feb. 2 to March 28 and encourages reducing waste, recycling and composting across campus.
The consumption of single-use disposables is rampant across the nation, but the U of L Sustainability Council is encouraging students to cut back by bringing their own items and taking advantage of U of L’s single-stream recycling system when possible.
The council will also be collecting food waste from dining locations such as the Ville Grill. Weekly winners who share images of their eco-efforts to Instagram or Facebook, tagging @UofLSustainable, will have a chance to win a gift card to Comfy Cow Ice Cream, Heine Bros. Coffee and others locations.
Ecolympics 2020 also includes a “Residence Hall Conservation Throw-Down” from Feb. 2 through Feb. 24. The nine residence halls on campus will be in competition with one another to see who can reduce their electricity use the most over the next three weeks.
Residents are encouraged to unplug their unused devices, turn off lights, take quicker showers, skip the elevator or turn down the heat. In addition to the weekly winners of the gift cards to Comfy Cow and Heine Bros., one resident who goes above and beyond during Ecolympics 2020 will receive a restored vintage Schwinn bicycle.
According to the buildingOS dashboard, Louisville Hall is currently in the lead with a 3.6 percent reduction of electricity since Feb. 4, while Kurz Hall is in last place with a 10.1 percent increase.
File Photo // The Louisville Cardinal
