Students in Residence Halls Compete to ‘Unplug’

By Christopher James

Every year, NYU’s residence halls consume more than 40 million kilowatt hours of electricity, representing 30 percent of the University’s purchased electricity and equivalent to the consumption of 4,000 U.S. homes. “NYUnplugged,” a month-long conservation competition held in April, aimed to reduce electricity consumption and raise awareness with a campaign focused on the social and ecological impacts of electricity generation as well as the personal benefits of “unplugging.”

      The program successfully encouraged students to cut electricity usage by an average of 6.5 percent, while Greenwich Hotel, the winning residence hall, managed to cut consumption by 24 percent. In all, NYUnplugged conserved well over 100,000 kilowatt hours, avoided more than 75 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions, and saved the University over $18,000—almost triple the cost of the project. Jeremy Friedman, project administrator for the NYU Sustainability Task Force, notes that judges did their best to factor out facilities improvements and weather differences before scoring the dorms’ reductions.

      “From the beginning, I wanted NYUnplugged to go beyond the scope of similar competitions at other campuses, and engage students in critical thinking about the complex ways that our electricity use influences society at the micro and macro scales,” said Adam Brock, student co-coordinator of the NYU competition.

      Co-coordinator Stephanie Phillips notes that the effort was a collaboration by members of NYU’s Sustainability Office and Department of Residential Education. Student groups involved included the Inter Residence Hall Council, Program Board, and the OSA Club Earth Matters, which helped with outreach and promotion at their events.

      “Many individual students joined our street team as well and helped with outreach in their individual Halls, promoting through tabling and by making announcements in their classes,” said Phillips.

      The competition is expected to continue in the 2009 academic year.

For more information on the effort, visit the competition’s Web site at www.nyu.edu/sustainability/campus.
projects/unplugged.html.