Media Credit: Christin Palazzolo [Click to enlarge]

View video from the day's events


Oregon has joined other universities across the nation in the effort to combat global warming.

At the campus Earth Day celebration Wednesday, University President Dave Frohnmayer announced his inclusion in the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment. In signing the commitment, Frohnmayer pledged to reduce and ultimately eliminate campus greenhouse gas emissions.

According to Frohnmayer, the document includes specifics for reducing the University's carbon footprint, which entail taking inventory of greenhouse gas emissions and developing an institutional action plan. It also includes time tables and mechanisms for tracking progress to see that goals are met.

While this new commitment is another important step in reducing the University's carbon dioxide emissions, Frohnmayer emphasized that it is neither the first nor the only time that the University has worked to become more environmentally friendly.

"Be proud that this isn't just a new project," Frohnmayer said. "This is something that, in some way, is part of the DNA of this very institution."

Frohnmayer said the United States' higher education system plays an important role as a beacon of progress, both in the past by battling for free speech and civil rights, and by leading the way in environmentalism for the future.

"Higher education must place itself on the front line of the battle of its time," Frohnmayer said. "An overwhelming array of evidence has convinced many of us and many more all the time that the challenge of climate control and climate change must be our new front line."

He said that both the country and the world need to seriously consider the cost of shifting to an emissions-free energy system and that the process "must begin here and must begin now."

Second-year student Topher Vollmer was in the audience for Frohnmayer's speech.

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