April 26, 2013 Originally hosted on Tuesday, April 23rd, “Implementation Strategies for Green Revolving Funds” covered valuable insights on implementing GRFs from administrators and research and consulting organizations. The webinar offered an overview of a new publication by SEI and AASHE — Green Revolving Funds: An Introductory Guide to Implementation and Management — and a road map and tips on starting and managing such funds, with examples from Agnes Scott College and the University of New Hampshire. AASHE and SEI have made a recording of this webinar and the PPT slides available to the public, available here.
March 26, 2013 On April 17, the Sustainable Endowments Institute will host the second Financing the Future of Energy Efficiency Summit. This year, the conference will be held at the University of San Diego and Rip Rapson, the president of the Kresge Foundation, will deliver the keynote address. The summit is co-hosted by Elizabeth Kiss, the President of Agnes Scott College, and Mitch Thomashow, the Director of Second Nature’s Presidential Fellows Program. Its theme is transforming energy efficiency upgrades from expenses to high-return investments, focusing on how colleges and universities play pivotal roles in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Learn more here.
March 22, 2013 Water efficiency projects are a natural fit for a green revolving fund (GRF) as they provide tangible environmental benefits and can have quick paybacks. Even smaller-scale projects such as installing low-flow showerheads, toilets, and faucet aerators in bathrooms or setting up water bins to collect rainwater for campus gardens can have big impacts. Schools like the University of Southern Maine, Harvard University, and Bethany College (Kansas) have already devoted some of their GRF funding to projects that conserve water.
Learn more here.
January 15, 2013 Green Revolving Funds: An Introductory Guide to Implementation and Management provides practical guidance for designing, implementing, and managing a green revolving fund at a college, university, or other nonprofit institution. Responding to calls for assistance with creating GRFs from many institutions, the Guide establishes best practices from interviews with presidents, facility managers, sustainability directors, and chief financial officers. The Guide includes sections on designing the various components of a GRF, a 10-step road map for designing and implementing the fund, and solutions for common obstacles. Read more here.
October 30, 2012 Greening the Bottom Line 2012 reports on the growing field of green revolving funds (GRFs) and their environmental and financial impact on college and university campuses. Though many of these GRFs are young- there have been 36 new funds created since 2010- their portfolios have already begun to post impressive returns, with a median reported return on investment of 28 percent. Collectively, these funds have committed over $111 million to energy and resource-use reduction projects. Read more here.
October 25, 2012 Many institutions with green revolving funds (GRFs) use Excel spreadsheets to track savings, while others don’t have the ability to track data after project installation. The Sustainable Endowments Institute has created the Green Revolving Investment Tracking System (GRITS) Beta, an online web tool that allows you to track all improvements achieved by your GRF: savings [...]
July 11, 2012 Joe Indvik, co-founder of Dartmouth College’s Green Revolving Fund and consultant with ICF International, outlines the nine rules that student leaders must follow as they launch their own GRF. Read about his experience at Dartmouth and his recommendations here.
May 29, 2012 Mitchell Thomashow, Director of the Second Nature Presidential Fellows Program, reflects on the “extraordinary gathering of participants” at the recent Financing the Future of Energy Efficiency Summit, held on the Harvard Campus this past May. Read his full post and his thoughts on the significance of the green revolving fund model here.
January 30, 2012 In “To Revolve or Not to Revolve?” Joe Indvik, former consultant of Dartmouth College’s Green Revolving Fund, explores the reasons why a growing number of institutions are seeking the green revolving fund model to fund cleantech investments on their campus. Indvik cites the motivating factors of GRFs’ dynamic ROIs, the opportunity for infinite scalability of achievable projects, and something that he calls the “sizzle” factor. Read more.
January 19, 2012 On Friday, January 27 from 2:30-3:30pm SEI, in partnership with the VEIC, will be hosting a webinar on GRF Accounting/Financing. Attendees will hear from accounting and finance representatives from the green revolving funds at Caltech, UNH, and Harvard.
