If you've ever sat at your desk fuming over the amount of paper your neighbor throws away daily, or grimaced over the lack of recycling at your office, or run around shutting off computers at 6 p.m., the Obama Administration is offering you a real treat this Halloween.
On Monday, the White House launched its GreenGov Challenge, an idea drive to stimulate the eco-friendliness of Uncle Sam by crowd-sourcing ideas for everyday conservation directly from government employees. The program is modeled after other Obama initiatives, and once again uses the Google Moderator service to facilitate user voting, this time on which ideas are good at preventing waste and which should simply be placed in the trash.
"To harness the collective wisdom of America's more than 1.8 million Federal and military personnel, we’re launching the GreenGov Challenge — an online participatory program that challenges federal and military personnel to take part in implementing the President’s Executive Order on Federal Sustainability by submitting their own clean energy ideas and suggestions and voting on others," the White House announcement said.
The GreenGov program will run until Oct. 31, at which point the administration will close the site to suggestions. Green is just not a winter thing it seems.
To contribute to the program, federal employees must create an account using their work emails and verify those accounts before being allowed to submit or vote on ideas.
Subject areas thus far include: sustainable buildings, sustainable products, eliminating waste, conserving water, conserving energy, and reducing carbon emissions.
Ideas receiving the most votes will be presented to the
Steering Committee on Federal Sustainability — a group comprised of
senior officials from each agency who are responsible for delivering
each agency’s sustainability plan under President Obama’s Executive
Order on Federal Sustainability.
So far, 233 ideas have been submitted that have received nearly 6,500 votes by 488 people.
A few of top ideas on the site include:
"Only offer reusable, recyclable, or biodegradable food service ware in cafeterias."
- Washington, DC
"All
government cafeterias should give discounts for bringing your own cup
when buying cofee or other drinks. Some private coffee shops do this;
it does not require new technology, and it is easy to implement."
-
Chicago
"Federal
agencies should set an example of efficient energy creation by
installing solar panels on their buildings and using the electricity
generated to power their operations."
"Federal
contracting should have a set-asides or preference for green businesses
when procuring products or services. Should be a separate category in
the same vein as woman/minority/native american/etc owned businesses."
- Washington, DC
"Water
Conserving Bathroom retrofits - replace current fixtures with water
saving toilets, urinals, and faucets. Research shows low flow/flush can
save 500+ gallons per employee yielding the same functional performance
w/ a 6 year payback period."
- Boston, MA
"Stop purchasing bottled water for all federal buildings."
-
Washington, DC
To explore and submit ideas,
visit http://www.whitehouse.gov/GreenGov/.