The annual James B. Francis Lecture on the Built Environment, featuring civil and environmental engineering alum Steven Fallon ’20, examined how artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics can help design more attainable and sustainable housing.

The Center for Wind Energy Science, Technology and Research (WindSTAR) continues to receive support from the National Science Foundation.

The Climate Cool Schools program is a collaborative sustainability initiative between the University of Massachusetts Lowell and National Grid.

Weston & Sampson's expansion into the Lowell Innovation Network Corridor further strengthens the company’s partnership with UMass Lowell.

The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) recently named UMass Lowell a platinum campus, the highest possible rating a college or university can earn for its sustainability performance through AASHE’s Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System (STARS).

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The UMass Lowell WindHawks are competing in the final round of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Collegiate Wind Competition, scheduled for May 12-15 in Boulder, Colorado.

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Backed by a $360,000 U.S. Army Research Office grant, Plastics Engineering Assoc. Prof. Wan-Ting (Grace) Chen is studying how biofilms affect the breakdown of plastic in freshwater environments. The three-year project could help prevent the formation of harmful microplastics

Honors graphic design seniors Andrea Garcia and Daly Grogan created “Earth Nouveau,” a set of sustainability-themed greeting cards inspired by the university’s eco-friendly initiatives. Sales of the nine-card sets benefit the Honors College Fellowship program.

Three students attended COP29 in Azerbaijan, thanks to funding from the Rist Institute for Sustainability and Energy.

Outcomes depends on relationship between federal government and states, says Professor Juliette Rooney-Varga.

With a new sustainability coordinator, the dining halls are incorporating more local produce and hosting sustainability-related events.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently awarded a four-year, $744,000 grant to Assoc. Prof. Jonas Baltrusaitis of Lehigh University and Prof. Meg Sobkowicz Kline of UMass Lowell to develop new mulch films for agricultural crops that are not only sustainable and biodegradable but will also help nourish and improve the health of soils and reduce plastic pollution.

The inaugural Department of Chemistry Research Symposium featured talks from green chemistry co-founder John Warner, faculty researchers and industry professionals.

As an intern with Facilities Management, computer science graduate student Neha Miryala has built new energy dashboards to raise student awareness of their carbon footprint and developed a data warehouse to help improve the university’s operational efficiency.

Funded by a $400,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, Environmental, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences Asst. Prof. Christopher Skinner and Prof. Mathew Barlow are studying how changes in vegetation affect climate.

The Massachusetts Gateway Cities Climate Resilience Center seeks to develop a community-driven climate resilience model in Lowell that can be replicated in other cities.

Recent efficiency projects at Perry Hall and Saab ETIC have slashed energy usage at the buildings and reduced their carbon footprints, and Facilities Management has more work on tap across campus.

Business alum Sean Harrington ’97, an All-American wrestler at UMass Lowell, has started Wolf Tree Wood, which sells one-of-a-kind wood slabs that can be used for custom furniture.

Assoc. Teaching Prof. of Art & Design Regina Milan was commissioned by the nonprofit Pollinator Partnership to create its 2024 poster, leveraging her extensive background in botanical and natural science illustration and her passion for nature and sustainability.

Climate scientist Juliette Rooney-Varga and environmental studies master’s student Lucia Cheney recently presented to local lawmakers at the Massachusetts State House.

The food forest on South Campus is being used for research, in academic courses and as a place for the community to gather.

Six sustainability-focused entrepreneurs and startups from across the region competed in the third annual Clean Green Challenge at the UMass Lowell Innovation Hub.

Students competing in the Climate Mitigation Challenge came up with innovative ways to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 10,000 pounds in 10 weeks.

UMass Lowell researchers are gearing up to expand their efforts targeting offshore wind energy as part of ARROW, a collaborative project with UMass Amherst, UMass Dartmouth and other partners that will accelerate research and the deployment and scale-up of domestic offshore wind energy. 

Chemistry Asst. Prof. Michael Ross received two Scialog: Negative Emissions Science awards for his greenhouse gas research proposals.

Students represented UMass Lowell in Dubai at COP28, the annual United Nations climate summit.

These helpful tips will have you enjoying the holidays with sustainability in mind.

Craic Sauce has created a UMass Lowell-branded hot sauce made with peppers grown on campus.

The Student Society for Sustainability hosted a Thrift Day event with clothes collected from the UMass Lowell community.

The Rist Institute for Sustainability and Energy granted fellowships to mechanical engineering major Caralyn Conrad, industrial engineering Ph.D. student Mahsa Ghandi and Art and Design Assoc. Prof. Kirsten Swenson.

Environmental Defense Fund fellow Dillan Patel has worked with UML’s Rist Institute for Sustainability and Energy over the summer to help create a community outreach plan for a geothermal pilot project.

UML climate scientists break down the wildfires in Canada and why the U.S. is feeling its effects.

Five projects created by members of the UML community received Sustainability Engagement and Enrichment Development (S.E.E.D.) funding from the Rist Institute for Sustainability and Energy.

A ceremonial planting on South Campus signified UMass Lowell’s new role as a certified arboretum – a place where trees and other plants are cultivated for scientific and educational purposes.

UMass Lowell was the first site selected for National Grid’s geothermal pilot project, which will heat and cool buildings in the area with utility-scale networked geothermal energy.

Chemistry Asst. Prof. Michael Ross’ lab group found that nanoparticles combining post-transition and noble metals absorb higher energies of light. Their discovery is highlighted in Matter, a scientific journal published by Cell Press.

Prof. Meg Sobkowicz-Kline and Asst. Teaching Prof. Akshay Kokil were awarded funding totaling $1 million by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Standards and Technology for projects that aim to reduce the amount of plastic that ends up in landfills and the environment each year.

Students taking the newly launched Climate Crisis and Society course worked in partnership with the city of Lowell on a climate resilience project. The work inspired them to develop their own climate projects.

Three students and three faculty members traveled to Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, for COP27, the United Nations climate summit, where they were the only delegation from a public university in Massachusetts.

The Rist Institute of Sustainability and Energy kicked off the newly launched Indoor Winter Farmers Market, featuring Lowell-based vendors.

The National Science Foundation-funded project Cool Science hosted its 10th annual Extreme Weather Art Competition for students in grades kindergarten through 12th. The winning posters are now displayed on transit buses in the Merrimack Valley and Worcester areas.

The Office of Sustainability and the University Library created the Sustainable Publishing Fund to help researchers, like Chemical Engineering Asst. Prof. Fanglin Che, publish their sustainability-related work in open-access journals.

Seven projects led by students, faculty and staff received a share of the university’s annual $50,000 Sustainability Encouragement & Enrichment Development (S.E.E.D.) Fund. 

Art Assoc. Prof. Ingrid Hess is traveling to some of the world’s most beautiful places to make artwork that educates children about the natural world and environmental sustainability. She’s won grants, fellowships and artist residencies to visit national parks in Costa Rica, Australia, the U.S. and more.

Hosted for the first time by UMass Lowell, the Student Sustainability Leaders Symposium brought together more than 100 students from 18 colleges and universities across the Northeast to share their work and explore opportunities for collaboration and partnerships.

UMass Lowell remains the highest-rated campus in Massachusetts for sustainability with a STARS Gold score of 83.37 from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education.

If you’re spending more on gas to get to campus, the university has several ways to save money on your commute — while decreasing carbon emissions.

Researchers led by Chemical Engineering Assoc. Prof. Hsi-Wu Wong was recently awarded a three-year, $1.6 million grant by the U.S. Department of Energy to help reduce waste plastic films.

UMass Lowell, which ranks No. 1 among colleges and universities for well-being and work according to the Sustainable Campus Index, has created an Office of Student Life and Well-being to better integrate wellness across campus.

More than 6 tons of appliances, electronics, batteries and more were collected at Fall into Recycling, a popular waste diversion program that contributed to UMass Lowell being named a Top 10 Zero Waste Campus by the Post-Landfill Action Network.

Science education can help slow the pace of global warming, because people who understand climate science can make informed decisions, says Education Assoc. Prof. Jill Hendrickson Lohmeier. Lohmeier does research on using artwork in informal settings to educate the public about climate science.

UMass Lowell, in partnership with the Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology in Boston, has received a $241,300 grant from the Commonwealth to develop academic pathways that increase the participation of underrepresented populations in the offshore wind industry.

A new rooftop garden of 500 herb, flower and vegetable plants has taken root at O’Leary Learning Commons on South Campus, the latest piece of UMass Lowell’s Urban Agriculture Program — a collaboration between the Office of Sustainability and Mill City Grows.

Hammock gardens, Adirondack chairs and patio heaters are just some of the amenities the university is adding to improve outdoor spaces for when students return to campus in the fall.

Transportation engineering graduate student Jenna Howard ’19 is leading the design of UML’s Pawtucket Greenway project through her work as a transportation infrastructure designer for the civil engineering firm TEC.

The Lowell Green Community Partnership, an alliance between UMass Lowell and the city, awarded its first $50,000 in grants to five joint university-community projects that advance urban sustainability initiatives.

With the collaboration between UMass Lowell’s Office of Sustainability and its Athletic Department serving as a model, the America East Conference has created a sustainability network that gives its 10 member institutions an opportunity to share best practices and advance green initiatives.

UMass Lowell was named “Innovator of the Year” at the first-ever Casella Sustainability Leadership Awards for the new and creative ways that the university sustains resources and diverts waste destined for landfills.

UMass Lowell’s Climate Change Initiative, in partnership with the Environmental, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences Department and the Rist Institute for Sustainability and Energy, is hosting a virtual spring seminar series featuring experts from across the country.

The Rist Institute for Sustainability and Energy has awarded its inaugural fellowships to Asst. Prof. of Economics Kelly Hellman, plastics engineering major Kerry Candlen and chemical engineering major Maria Fonseca-Guzman.

As food insecurity grows because of the coronavirus pandemic, the university’s Urban Agriculture Program is helping to provide fresh, healthy produce to the community through its partnership with Mill City Grows.

Three student projects proposing ways to reduce the university community’s carbon dioxide emissions by 10,000 pounds in 10 weeks received the first-ever Rist Institute for Sustainability and Energy (RISE) Student Innovation Awards and a share of $1,000 in prize money.

The Office of Sustainability held its first Sustainable Move-In event on campus, collecting 62 large trash bags of plastic foam and enough cardboard to fill four large dumpsters.

Rover the River Hawk, an Industrial Capstone Senior Design project that Engineering students are building to clean debris from the city’s canals, received a Green Design award from the Lowell Sustainability Council and a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition from U.S. Rep. Lori Trahan.

The university’s waste reduction efforts ranked fifth in the 2019 Sustainable Campus Index, up five spots from the previous year. The university’s Urban Agriculture Program was also highlighted in the index, which is published by the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE).

The UMass Lowell Climate Change Initiative, in conjunction with the National Association of Geoscience Teachers and the College of Education, hosted a professional development workshop for two dozen area K-12 teachers on incorporating climate change education into the classroom.

Students donated more than 14,000 pounds of clothing, bedding, food and personal items during this spring’s Sustainable Move Out Donation Drive, which benefitted a half-dozen nonprofit organizations across the community.

From grazing sheep to battery-powered lawn mowers, Grounds Operations Manager Erik Shaw is coming up with innovative ways to maintain the campus grounds – and help boost the university’s sustainability efforts.

A team of researchers from UMass Lowell, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and China Agricultural University in Beijing has developed a new, sustainable way of converting wet biological waste into diesel-compatible fuel, using heat and water.

Faculty, staff and students dropped off more than 6 tons of personal electronics, appliances and more during April’s two-day Spring Into Recycling event, run by the Office of Sustainability and Information Security.

The university’s Climate Change Initiative hosted members of the state’s House Committee on Global Warming and Climate Change for a roundtable discussion on climate science and policy at which faculty members shared scientific research and expertise to help inform policy decisions.

Rows of kale, Swiss chard and collard greens are growing on the new Green Roof vegetable garden at University Crossing, a collaboration between Mill City Grows and UML’s Urban Agriculture Program, Student Government Association and Office of Sustainability.

The university marked two major milestones at its Earth Day celebration: the completion of its $23.1 million Accelerated Energy Program and its latest STARS Gold rating, which moves UML into the top 10 nationally.

UMass Lowell and the Division of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance (DCAMM) celebrated the completion of the university's $23.1 million Accelerated Energy Program (AEP) at a ceremony Monday.

Six of the 12 projects to receive a share of the $50,000 Sustainability Encouragement & Enrichment Development (S.E.E.D.) Fund this year were led by students, the most in the fund’s three-year history.

The River Hawk Shop now gives customers recyclable paper bags instead of single-use plastic bags, a move that will eliminate around 10,000 plastic bags from the waste stream each year.