Sustainability

Sustainability

Trayless Dining Sycamore Dining Hall is a trayless dining facility. Thank you for working with us to reduce our carbon footprint. Everytime you use a plate without a tray, you are saving a quart of water, one ounce of food waste, plus the energy and detergent that is needed to wash the trays.

Local Farms

We work hard to get as many ingredients locally as possible. Our professionally-trained chefs write our menus to take advantage of the fresh fruits and vegetables that are naturally in season.

Reusable Cup Discount

The environment and your pocketbook win! Bring your own reusable cup to purchase coffee and save money every time.

Green Paper Goods

We have reduced the amounts of papergoods that we use in all locations and whenever possible we utilize compostable greenware papergoods.

Xpress Napkin Holders

XPressnap dispensers are another solution to reducing energy and waste. They use 30% less paper than traditional napkin dispensing mechanisms. The great thing about these dispensers is that they help the environment while helping to keep costs down. The napkins are made of 100% recycled paper and the dispenser will encourage customers to take (and waste) less napkins. Energy is saved because less power is used to recycle paper products than to create them from virgin material. According to Xpressnap, enough is saved through using recycled napkins to power 600 American homes for an entire year! More than half a million gallons of oil were saved ‘ 38 tanker trucks worth ‘ and 41 tons of pollutants were kept out of the environment. Using recycled napkins diverted 4,131 cubic yards of paper from landfills. This is enough to cover a football field with a stack of paper two and a half feet deep.

APEX Dishwashing System

As part of its commitment to increase the sustainability of its operations, Dining Services uses Ecolab’s Apex™ dishwashing system. Apex combines technology and products designed to save water and energy, minimize the impact of products on the environment, and has a built-in method of measuring results. Apex uses a unique combination of detergents, rinse additives, equipment and consultative services to address the operational challenges in food-service operations. The Apex management approach uses a tablet PC and wireless technology to communicate with the system's controller to download, process and analyze data to establish each food-service operation's "rack-to-guest ratio." By monitoring and improving this ratio, the system helps reduce the amount of water and energy used at each facility, and improve total operational efficiency. All locations will benefit from using less water, energy and labor, thus minimizing their operations' overall environmental impact. In addition, the Apex system further supports Dining Services' sustainability initiatives with non-caustic chemistry and 95% less packaging material than current methods.

My Zone

Sycamore Dining features a My Zone Pantry for students with specific allergies. My Zone is a gluten-free, peanut and tree-nut free area reserved for people with allergies and other special diet needs. This special area gives students the ability to be involved in their own allergen-safe meal preparation.