UGA Green Zone

UGA established a new 81-acre Green Zone in 2023 located on the central campus around Tate Student Center and Sanford Stadium. The goal of this Green Zone was to pilot the use of "electric-only landscaping equipment" and other green practices to reduce emissions and noise, and improve air quality and health and well-being. As one of our data driven Clean Energy projects, the project is keenly focused on measuring the benefits of these innovations to the campus community, and communicating our lessons learned to other higher education institutions.

As one of UGA's five campus landscape zones, this central zone is the first to begin transitioning to a more environmentally friendly space for students, staff, and campus visitors. By implementing sustainable land management practices and reducing on-site noise, pollution, water usage, synthetic chemicals, and energy usage, UGA's Central Green Zone aims to set a standard for sustainable landscape management.

• Establish Green Zone Program on campus during the Spring 2023 Semester
• Work with Landscape Crews and UGA Organizations to promote similar projects focused on environmental ethics and the conservation of natural spaces.
• Collect feedback from crews and service technicians on usage data and equipment efficiency.
• Engage with campus visitors to gauge the perception of the project goals and benefits.
• Develop communication methods to spread awareness of the purpose and goal of the green zone and its contribution to campus. Posters, Surveys GIS maps, and other methods.
• Generate a comprehensive understanding of the costs and benefits of this new program and its impact on campus, students, and the environment.

After the completion of a 1-year study of the rollout of the Green Zone (started March 2023) the results of this study were shared at the 3rd Annual conference of Grounds Department management teams from SEC universities on April 9th, 2024. One month later the project outcomes were shared at the quarterly UGA Facilities Management Division Leadership Team meeting. We plan to share the results of our progress so far with the Southeastern Region Association of Physical Plant Administrators (SRAPPA) in November, 2024. Below is an abbreviated version of the presentation and project results.

A primary goal of the Green Zone is to reduce on-site emissions produced from routine landscape maintenance. After identifying two-stroke gas-oil engines as a large contributor to landscape emissions, UGA's Grounds Department partnered with the Office of Sustainability to purchase state-of-the-art electric landscape equipment to replace the gas-oil engines in the Green Zone.

There is a perception that electric lawn equipment may not measure up to their gas-powered counterparts. This project is designed to put that notion to the test, and to demo and vet newer electric models to determine their capabilities to meet performance criteria.

This project is supported by an Office of Sustainability Green Zone Intern embedded within the Grounds Department. The Green Zone intern:

• Tracks energy use and maintenance data
• Works side by side with Grounds crew to obtain feedback on new equipment performance, data tracking, and recommendations for project improvements
• Reports and communicates the results of the project to broad audiences using written reports, presentations, and audio/visual tools to make the program widely familiar to the UGA community and beyond.
• Develop a more complete model of how it compares to the gas equipment used to maintain the rest of campus.

The following is a brief history of our outstanding Green Zone Interns.

Two-stroke engines are much less efficient in combustion than four-stroke engines (which are standard in cars); they burn a mix of oil and gasoline; and they emit a lot of this combustion mixture directly into the atmosphere, unburned. According to the  EPA , in 1 hour, 1 gas lawn mower: pollutes the same as 40 late model cars, emits the same amount of hydrocarbons (precursors to ground-level ozone) as a SUV driven 23,600 miles, and contribute 93 times more smog-forming emissions that 2006 cars. In addition to being heavy sources of pollution in concentrated areas, conventional equipment is also very loud which can cause disruptions to nearby programs and hearing damage if those in close proximity are not wearing adequate protection. The new electric equipment not only produces no on-site emissions, but is also 50-70% quieter than the gas machines. With the potential for this new equipment to be powered by solar energy, the Grounds Department is exploring options to reduce our carbon footprint even further by collaborating with engineering capstone students for solar charging.