Policy Progress

While each campus collaborated with its consultants and staff to develop localized recommendations, the working group partnered with a systemwide consultant to synthesize findings and insights. These collaborative discussions facilitated coordination among campuses, enabled the sharing of best practices and led to the identification of potential decarbonization equity indicators. In the coming year, the systemwide working group will evaluate the proposed equity indicators, select the most feasible and impactful, and explore ways to integrate them into broader sustainability decision-making processes beyond decarbonization and electrification efforts.

Developing potential equity indicators for sustainability projects is an important and foundational step in advancing the University’s commitment to incorporating an inclusive and justice-oriented perspective in addressing environmental challenges.

In fiscal year 2023–24, dining operations continued to ramp up with students returning to full-time in-person classes on campuses and expansions at academic health centers. Increased demand for food, as well as food cost inflation, led to a 14% increase in food spend systemwide compared to the prior year, driven by an 11% food spend increase on campuses and 22% increase at academic health centers. At the same time, spend on food purchases that met one or more sustainability criteria increased by 16% on campuses during the same period and stayed at the same level at academic health centers. As a result, sustainable food spend represented 18% of food purchases on campuses and 20% of purchases at health centers in FY 2023-24. This amounts to over $37 million going to sustainable food suppliers, almost $3.5 million more than the previous year. 

Of the University’s total food and beverage spend, 30%, or over $75 million, was on plant-based food items. This represents a $25 million increase over the prior year. Ten locations are already on track to meet the policy goal of at least 25% spend on plant-based food by 2030.

In its pilot year, the Leading on Climate Sustainable Food Services Fellowship supported several campuses and academic health centers in their efforts to improve data collection to support President Drake’s goal of “defining the actions and resources needed to procure at least 25 percent of our own food supplies from sustainable sources by 2025, five years ahead of the University’s existing goal.” The Global Climate Leadership Council also funded a project to provide technical assistance in advancing sustainable food supply chain sourcing and dining practices. In this first year of the project, the team engaged all campuses and academic health centers to understand challenges, opportunities, and future planning and collaboration opportunities. At the completion of the project, all UC dining teams convened at a summit to review the project outcomes and build momentum for the future.

In the past fiscal year, UC locations reported 18 new LEED-certified green building projects, including two Platinum, nine Gold, six Silver, and one Certified facilities. UC’s total LEED certifications now include 445 projects. The University’s building portfolio also includes 30 all-electric facilities and another three that do not use electricity for space or water heating (together these account for over 3 million square feet of occupied space). An additional 50 electric buildings (over 9 million square feet) are currently in development. UC locations are pursuing Parksmart certification for 10 new parking projects, adding to the University’s three existing certified facilities.

To further reduce the environmental footprint of its built infrastructure, the University launched the UC Low Carbon Showcase Project to highlight existing facilities designed to reduce embodied carbon. The showcase will create resource documents and training materials to demonstrate the benefits of low-carbon construction, such as advanced timber and green steel. Design techniques like life-cycle assessment and adaptive reuse will also be featured.

The University continues to partner with its strategic suppliers to improve sustainability practices across our supply chains. The University continues to use the EcoVadis tool to obtain supplier sustainability ratings covering environmental practices, labor and human rights, ethics and sustainable procurement. The platform is tracking more than 200 suppliers representing over $4.3 billion in spend. 

The University piloted a new process this year to improve its sustainable campus procurement data collection. The University analyzed data for over $90 million in total spend from 27 suppliers for the 2023–24 fiscal year. Within that spend, the University found that 69% of electronics, 91% of indoor office furniture, 45% of cleaning supplies and 24% of office supplies met UC’s requirements on minimum or preferred green spend, as outlined in the Sustainable Procurement Guidelines. This represents over $62 million in spend on products meeting green certification standards. This year, UC Health locations are also reporting their green spend on office supplies and electronics for the first time, as well as waste avoidance and cost savings from reprocessing equipment. Analysis of UC’s support of small businesses, presented to the state each year, can be found online.

Trademarks and Licensing

The UC Code of Conduct for Trademark Licensees Steering Committee met throughout the 2023–24 academic year to collectively assess trademark licensees’ progress on achieving their legally binding, contractual commitments to safe and fair workplaces in all facilities in which UC trademark licensed products are manufactured.

The committee discussed notable developments affecting UC campuses, including:

• U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s enforcement of the landmark 2022 federal law Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act and the heightened risk of forced labor that UC campuses face as a result of licensees sourcing in China without the presence of independent, transparent assessments of workplace conditions and freely functioning human rights organizations.
• Identification of UC licensees that source their products from production facilities in Pakistan required to sign the Pakistan Accord for health and safety in the textiles and garment industry, a legally binding agreement to achieve safe factories with the agreement of apparel businesses, international unions, worker advocacy organizations and the International Labor Organization. Signatories include a growing list of licensee and international apparel brands, encompassing more than 80% of licensees that have disclosed manufacturing sources in Pakistan for UC campuses’ products.
• Remediation of wages and benefits owed to workers at Style Avenue, in El Salvador, by licensee Outerstuff following the factory’s closure.

Overall, the global impact of the University of California’s licensed product manufacturing extends to 52 countries where more than 4,000 disclosed suppliers manufacture for 342 licensee companies that are licensed to use UC campus trademarks on products that are sold to the public.

In 2023–24, the overall (student and employee) single-occupancy-vehicle (SOV) rate for the University of California was approximately 27%. This means over 70% of students, faculty and staff utilized a sustainable commute option, such as telecommuting or commuting to campus by walking, biking, taking transit, or in a vanpool or carpool. Telecommuting practices have remained steady over the past few years (much higher than pre-pandemic levels), and most locations continue to report a higher rate of employee and student use of sustainable commute modes year-over-year and when compared to the 2014-15 baseline. However, despite this progress, just over half of the reporting locations are meeting next year’s goal of reducing SOV commute rates by 10%. The University is analyzing options for post-2025 sustainable transportation targets to support the University’s greenhouse gas reduction and sustainability goals.  

Systemwide, 49% of all new fleet vehicles (light, medium and heavy-duty) acquired in fiscal year 2023–24 were battery-electric, plug-in hybrid or another qualifying clean transportation fuel vehicle, up 4% from the previous year. UC’s goal is that alternatively powered vehicles account for at least 50% of all vehicle acquisitions at each campus (regardless of vehicle size). This year, UC policy also required that all sedan and minivan acquisitions be zero-emission or plug-in hybrid vehicles. Systemwide, 74% of all sedans and minivans acquired met those criteria, falling short of the goal but representing a doubling of the percentage of acquisitions that met the criteria the year before. 

Over 2,100 active electric vehicle (EV) charging ports (and many more EV-ready locations) are installed at UC locations to support electric fleet and commute vehicles.

UC’s systemwide potable water use per capita decreased from the previous year. Progress in water conservation continues, as nine UC locations exceeded their 2025 goal of reducing potable water use per person by 36% and the remaining locations continue to make efforts to meet or exceed the goal. Water use is not directly correlated with campus population, and consumption from process water use for research and building cooling remains significant.

UC locations are evaluating recycled water and stormwater capture opportunities, in alignment with resilience efforts to upgrade aging infrastructure, adapt to climate change and decarbonize energy use. The systemwide Water Working Group is developing a strategy for funding these types of projects. In addition, the working group is engaging stakeholders across the system to update drinking water policy to increase access to drinking water.