Sustainability at Fordham

EPA Taps Fordham to Manage $50M Environmental Justice Grant Program

Fordham will serve as a grantmaker to community-based groups in New York, New Jersey, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands and will also fund the environmental research of its own faculty.

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Workers installing solar panels on top of a building on the Rose Hill campus

Minimizing Our Environmental Impact

By working to reduce the greenhouse gases generated from all aspects of our operations, we have reduced our carbon emissions intensity by 31.77% and energy consumption by 22.6% since 2005. 

At Fordham, we endeavor to design, construct and maintain our buildings, infrastructure, and grounds in a manner that ensures environmental sustainability and demonstrates sustainability best practices in a broad range of areas. We're committed to reducing our environmental impact through targeted, verifiable measures that focus on reducing our greenhouse gases generated from all aspects of our operations. 

See our Climate Action Report

Cover of Laudato Si: Care for Our Common Home by Pope Francis

Care for Our Common Home

On Earth Day 2021, Pope Francis issued Laudato Si, a new imperative to our world to act courageously in addressing climate change.

This bold and visionary approach asks all Catholic institutions to holistically transform over the next seven years to stave off catastrophic global warming. At Fordham, the offices of mission integration and ministry, the provost, and facilities management came together to respond.

After convening a task force for six months, the University published its Laudato Si’ Action Plan, joining 67 other universities around the world in doing so. The document is a seven-year plan with goals that touch on everything from hosting an annual sustainability conference and conducting a comprehensive study of waste management on campus to establishing a sustainability panel at Fordham’s International Conference on Cyber Security.

Learn more about Fordham's Laudato Si Action Plan

More Sustainability News at Fordham

Fordham Makes Princeton Review’s Top Green Colleges List for 2025

Fordham Makes Princeton Review’s Top Green Colleges List for 2025

Fordham has been named to The Princeton Review’s “Top Green Colleges List: 2025 Edition.” The university earned a sustainability score of 87/99 in recognition of its commitment to sustainability on …

New Class Highlights Cities’ Role in Fighting Climate Change

New Class Highlights Cities’ Role in Fighting Climate Change

If humanity is going to survive climate change, many of the solutions are going to come from cities.  Urban areas are currently home to 55% of the world’s population, according …

Reading Philosophy with AI, Salamander Survival, and Reforestation: Grad Students Research Timely Topics

Reading Philosophy with AI, Salamander Survival, and Reforestation: Grad Students Research Timely Topics

In the first gathering of its kind, students from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) gathered at the McShane Campus Center on the Rose Hill campus on April 16 to …

Caring for Our Common Home: Fordham Sustainability Spring Update

Caring for Our Common Home: Fordham Sustainability Spring Update

At the Climate Action Summit held April 8 at Rose Hill, several elected officials were on hand to celebrate Fordham’s new role as an EPA grantmaker. U.S. Senate Majority Leader …

Water and Migration: Professor Studies Drought-Impacted Communities in Mali

Water and Migration: Professor Studies Drought-Impacted Communities in Mali

Isaie Dougnon, Ph.D., an associate professor of French and Francophone studies and international humanitarian affairs, has spent the last few months running a research project that hits close to home— …

Annual Summit Focuses on Climate Change Leadership

Annual Summit Focuses on Climate Change Leadership

Daylong Event Calls for Grassroots Action and Celebrates Fordham’s Role as EPA Grantmaker We don’t all have to be scientists to fight climate change, a prominent marine biologist and activist …

Where Are They Now? How the Fordham Foundry Helped These Alumni Launch Their Startups

Where Are They Now? How the Fordham Foundry Helped These Alumni Launch Their Startups

Since 2012, the Fordham Foundry has supported scores of students, alumni, faculty, and community members along their journeys as entrepreneurs, from hosting pitch competitions with cash prizes, like the Ram’s …

Professor Finds No Direct Causal Effect of Air Pollution on Severe COVID Symptoms

Professor Finds No Direct Causal Effect of Air Pollution on Severe COVID Symptoms

During and after the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers noticed that people living in areas with higher air pollution were likely to suffer from more severe symptoms of the virus. But was …

Bringing Oysters Back to the Bronx

Bringing Oysters Back to the Bronx

Perched on a skiff bobbing off the shores of City Island one sunny August morning, Kevin Horbatiuk, FCLC ’78, LAW ’81, watched a fellow volunteer with City Island Oyster Reef …

Nature Publishes Fordham Professor’s Research on Disproportionate Impacts of Climate Change

Nature Publishes Fordham Professor’s Research on Disproportionate Impacts of Climate Change

Fordham professor Marc Conte and fellow researchers have devised a model to predict the impacts of climate change on individual economies worldwide, and the outlook is bleak for the least …

Caring for Our Common Home: Fordham Sustainability Update

Caring for Our Common Home: Fordham Sustainability Update

Last summer, in response to a call from Pope Francis to “take concrete actions in the care of our common home,” Fordham published the Laudato Si’ Action Plan. The document …