We’ve all been rejoicing at the sight of green flags on the lawns outside Butler lately, but Bwog was much less pleasantly surprised to find a similar hue within the building. Water of a somewhat sickly shade was spotted in a fountain on the 5th floor last night. Not only that, but it appears there is a most misleading sign behind the basin. Keep your wits about you, and we gently suggest that you don’t drink the water.

We know what you're thinking, and it probably doesn't taste like Mountain Dew

In case you’re curious as to what the sign says, it reads:

“This water is most likely safe. If you have any concerns about contamination due to hydraulic fracturing, expose water to flame.”

Disclaimer: Bwog in no way endorses the use of unsupervised pyrotechnics in an effort to resolve any and all water discoloration issues.

The Grant Houses Community Garden Project is exactly what it sounds like. Columbia students want to help public housing residents just north of us build a garden for communal use that could become a sustainable and nutritious food source as well as a source of community pride. Liz Naiden reports on the saga of this unusual attempt to go green off-campus.

Twice a week, Rebecca Davies leads a handful of Columbia students up Broadway to the Grant Houses, a public housing development just 7 blocks from College Walk. The students currently lead regular workshops there for an after school program on all things green, sustainable, and nutritious. Well, all things green that kids could ever care about – in recent workshops they have explored worm composting (below), the water cycle, how to roast pumpkin seeds, and the journey that every element of a hamburger takes to get to your plate. The kids learn that everything they eat comes from the soil, and as a bonus “they love anything slimy they can play with, or anything they can taste,” says Davies. But that isn’t all the Grant Houses Community Garden project has always hoped to be.

Over two years ago, Davies got involved in the development of the Food Sustainability Project’s on-campus Community Garden project. In the process of getting recognized as a university group, Davies helped gather professor endorsements for the project, including the endorsement of Professor Sudhir Venkatesh. It was he who first asked Davies what more she would do with the community garden idea if she had the support. She wanted to bring a community garden to “the community outside of Columbia,” she said.

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Recycling at Columbia is complicated. Each campus has different rules that often differ from municipal laws or our hometown laws.

Bwog spoke with Cathy Resler from the office of Environmental Stewardship to find out more. Simply put, Barnard College recycles everything. Columbia’s Morningside campus, however, follows city laws.

The flowcharts often posted near recycling centers are too long and detailed for most people to bother with, and as a result, recyclables are often contaminated with unrecyclable materials.

To simplify your life, we have created a Handy Flowchart Thinger that should answer the constant question, “Can I recycle this?” Beware, this chart is only valid for the main Columbia Campus–not TC, MC, or Lamont-Doherty (click here for a printable black-on-white version):

Click for a large pretty PDF.

“But why,” you ask, “does Columbia only recycle certain materials?” We answer that question after the jump.

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Well, there could be, if you want them. You probably won’t find them invading uninvited, but if you chose, these creepy crawlers could help to significantly eliminate your own food waste and the university’s carbon footprint. Bwog’s Slime Specialist Liz Naiden reports on the initiatives to bring worm composting technology to students in the first installment of GreenBwog; a feature on cool green stuff students are doing around campus. 

There are currently nine worm boxes at Columbia: two in the Greenboro special interest house and seven in the rooms of members of the Food Sustainability Project, which co-sponsors The Worm Initiative with the EcoReps. There used to be a tenth box, says EcoRep Todd Nelson as he sets down his box o’worms for show and tell. The girl who kept it developed a phobia of the creatures’ undulation early in the year and had to give up her own box. They undulate like snakes, she said. 

Sad, says Nelson, considering how cool the critters are. Worms are essentially eating and pooping tubes – food goes in one way, poo comes out the other. But their poo smells way better than ours – in fact, Nelson’s composting box smells positively like nature. Well, it smells like soil, because worm poo is the fertilizer found in natural dirt. The fertilizers produced by these particular worms will go to Columbia’s Community Garden Project.

But perhaps more important than what comes out is what goes in. Mixed in with a layer of wet newspaper is various vegan food waste from the house – the worms, as well as many Greenborough residents, are devout vegans. It’s possible that the worms are conscious of the worldwide impact of their diets, but more importantly, non-vegan material would make the box smell like a lot more like a city garbage can. Read more…

Sean Zimmermann reports from last night’s meeting

In one of the speediest (and most poorly attended) ESC meetings yet, council members celebrated Secretary Heidi Ahmed’s birthday, discussed PMSing (or post midterm snacking), and heard updates on the Diana. 

SGA liaison Jessica Lewis announced that there was “lots of Diana discussion” at the last SGA meeting.  SGA wondered how it might set up a system for students to reserve space in the new student center, and also announced that the Diana will have a ribbon cutting ceremony on February third.  Barnard has invited the New York Senators and Mayor Bloomberg to the ceremony, and anxiously awaits their responses.  Perhaps Barnard’s early invites don’t bode so well for Thompson’s chances. 

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James Hansen spoke out against global warming twenty years ago. Now he’s raising a (peaceful) army. Hansen, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and an adjunct professor at Columbia’s Earth and Environmental Sciences Department, has issued an invitation to “the largest mass civil disobedience for the climate in U.S. history.” On Monday, March 2, Capitol Climate Action will stage a non-violent demonstration at “Washington D.C.’s Capitol Power Plant.” The demand: stronger action on the climate crisis from the new president. 

The CCA’s website doesn’t give specifics, but it suggests participants carry at least $50 at all times. That’s the minimum cost to bail yourself out of jail for activist-related civil disobedience in our capital city.

Those who’d prefer not to demonstrate can attend the rally beforehand, or any one of the many events of Power Shift 09, the weekend-long youth climate conference preceding the march. Consider it the most civic-minded midterm-week study break you’ll ever see.

Everyone’s favorite lottery process, also known as “Housing,” has begun, and the housing office announced two new SICs opening up next year. That’s Special Interest Communities, for you rising sophomores who haven’t looked them up during your desperate search for a single.

On top of the seven others that will roll over from 2008 (there are eight on the webpage, but, fittingly, the economics house is shutting down after this year), 114 Rue de Fleurus, a creative writing house/pretentious name pioneer, and GreenBurough, a house that’s–well–Green, are joining the fray.

Rue de Fleurus will be on the second floor of Wien and plans to host writing workshops and lectures. Residents will also relish the only time in their lives that creative writing will get them a house. GreenBurough will be in a townhouse on 114th next to Potluck house, and coordinator Liz Allocco says the house will require members to do things “like using drying racks instead of dryers and timing our showers.” In other words, whatever your parents made you do for a day after seeing An Inconvienient Truth. G-Burough also plans to try composting their waste in worm bins, which, if the wind is blowing the wrong way, may cause Potluck to lose its appetite.

For the rest of Columbia, the housing hunt will continue…

                                                                                                                              -DJB

Bwog recently received in its inbox a glimmering copy of “Sustainable Columbia E-News,” apparently a seasonal update for community members of the university’s most recent steps towards increased environmental stewardship. 

With information about everything from Columbia’s greenhouse gas inventory to a listing of Columbia’s most recent sustainability score, “Sustainable Columbia E-news” details a wide range of intitiatives to reduce Columbia’s carbon foortprint and improve its long-term commitment to the environment

A formal launch email from Senior Executive Vice President, Robert Kasdin, officially announced the emergence of the new e-newsletter as an update on the “broad participation by students, faculty, and staff…in the shared goal of becoming even more sustainable and energy efficient in our operations and daily lives” and perhaps adds one more of many bureacratic messages to your already flooded email inbox.  But, its for a good cause, so you might as well read it.

Bwog hopes you have a chance to give it a gander soon.

Finally, finally, Columbia has gotten some recognition for its dogged drive towards greenishness: a good-enough-everywhere-but-Columbia grade of A- on the third annual Sustainability Report Card for American colleges. The decision ties us with 14 other schools (including four Ivies, none of which were in New Haven, not that we care about that or anything). And it’s probably the most drastic improvement we’ll ever get in a national ranking, up from a B grade just last year.

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