The University of Pennsylvania’s Green Purchasing Awards presented by Penn’s Purchasing Services and Green Campus Partnership were announced at the annual Purchasing Services Supplier Show on September 28.

The awards honor leading actions of an individual or team that significantly advance the development of sustainable purchasing practices at Penn.

Three Green Purchasing Awards were presented this year.

“With Penn’s dedication to environmental sustainability, it’s important for Purchasing Services to not only promote green purchasing, but to recognize those individual champions throughout our Schools and Centers,” said Mark Mills, executive director of Penn Purchasing Services. “When we review nominations each year, it’s incredibly fun and rewarding to learn about the smart, responsible purchasing activities that are taking place among Penn’s purchasing community – many of which can be shared and repeated across the University.”

The first award was bestowed to Janel Baselice, executive assistant to the Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences (SAS). Ms. Baselice’s “Bright Green Idea” was to purchase and install reusable, plastic sign holders for waste and recycling updates made by the School’s Green Team. Previously, SAS used laminated signs, which were then put in the landfill stream when signage was updated. The new sign holders, purchased at the relatively low cost of $164.25, serve multiple purposes and allow the new signs to be recycled as clean office paper. This “Bright Green Idea” has been implemented throughout 37 buildings at hundreds of recycling cans in public spaces.

Another Green Purchasing Award recipient was a team from Facilities and Real Estate Services (FRES). Over the past two years, the honorees collaborated on 60 projects that provided reductions in electric consumption to qualify for rebates of over $3.4 million from the PECO Act 129 Energy Efficiency and Conservation Plan. One of the Act’s programs is called “Smart Ideas,” which is designed to help offset the increased costs typically associated with investing in more energy-efficient equipment. In Penn’s case, the rebates are for energy-efficiency improvements to the campus in the form of lighting replacements, new steam-driven chillers, upgraded equipment controls and modernized HVAC equipment. The award recipients include Rafael De Luna, project manager; William Dierkes, project manager; Chris Kern, director, design and construction; John Mahony, senior project manager; Margo Pietras Barnes, senior project manager; George Zafiropoulos, director, design and construction; Andrew Zarynow, energy planning engineer; and John Zurn, Century Bond project director.

The Disposable Petri Dish Reduction Project also was a Green Purchasing Award recipient. The Penn Genetics and Penn Genome Frontiers Institute (PGFI) team of Shaili Patel, research scientist; Elicia Preston, research scientist; and Junie Showell, technician, joined forces on a waste minimization and reduction project to replace disposable plastic petri dishes with reusable glass petri dishes. The project has significantly reduced lab waste at the PGFI facility. The team reports that this initiative has reduced autoclave trash generated by the lab by approximately one-third.

These initiatives align with Penn’s Climate Action Plan 2.0, the University’s comprehensive strategic roadmap for environmental sustainability that sets forth standards and goals for campus performance as part of the Penn’s collective commitment to reduce carbon emissions, engage the community and expand sustainability-related teaching and research.

For more information about the Green Purchasing Award recipients and their accomplishments, visit www.upenn.edu/purchasing