SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSES. 
(a) FINDINGS.—The Congress finds the following: 
(1) The environmental life-support systems vital 
to the Nation’s economic and social prosperity are 
increasingly at risk. 
(2) The Nation’s institutions of higher edu-
cation have a unique role to play in fostering new 
knowledge, evaluating policies, and discovering new 
technologies to address the persistent and often 
linked environmental, social, and economic problems 
that exist. 
(3) Achieving more sustainable environmental, 
economic and social systems will require new re-
search, education and technology development, and 
innovative policy approaches that are flexible and 
use market mechanisms while engaging relevant 
stakeholders from the private and public sectors. 
(4) For the Nation to remain competitive in 
this global world of increasingly limited natural re-
sources, higher education institutions need to take 
immediate steps to create new research, education 
and technology development that reflect the frame-
work of sustainability. 
(5) The Nation’s higher education institutions 
also are uniquely positioned to prepare the future 
labor force for addressing threats to, and seeking 
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opportunities for economic, environmental, and so-
cial sustainability. 
(6) The Nation’s higher education institutions 
are places where approaches that integrate the envi-
ronmental, social and economic dimensions can be 
designed, tested, and refined for application to real 
world settings in collaboration with industry, govern-
ment and the nonprofit sector. 
(7) The Nation’s higher education institutions 
are uniquely situated to be models of sustainable 
management and operations that can provide exam-
ples to industry and government of operational 
strategies that integrate the basic principles of envi-
ronmental, economic, and social sustainability. 
(8) Numerous State governors, including those 
of Oregon, Washington, New Jersey, and California 
have issued executive orders for the development of 
State sustainability plans. 
(9) Hundreds of college campuses have already 
made commitments to sustainable practices and less-
ening their carbon footprint, but lack a cohesive 
plan. 
(10) Additionally, many campuses now offer 
courses on sustainability, but no comprehensive sys-
tem exists to evaluate and compare colleges and uni-
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versities in terms of overall sustainability related 
academic programs and practices. 
(b) PURPOSES.—The purposes of this Act are— 
(1) to provide support to faculty, staff, and stu-
dents at institutions of higher education to establish 
administrative and academic sustainability programs 
on campus and a means to measure their effective-
ness; 
(2) to promote and enhance research by faculty 
and students at institutions of higher education in 
sustainability practices and innovations that assist 
and improve sustainability; and 
(3) to provide support to institutions of higher 
education to work with community partners from the 
business, government, and nonprofit sectors to de-
sign and implement sustainability programs for ap-
plication in the community and workplace. 
SEC. 3. ESTABLISHMENT OF PROGRAM. 
Title VII of the Higher Education Act of 1965 is 
amended by adding at the end the following new part: 
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‘‘PART E—UNIVERSITY SUSTAINABILITY 
PROGRAMS 
‘‘Subpart 1—Sustainability Planning Grants 
‘‘SEC. 771. PROGRAM AUTHORIZED. 
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary shall, from the 
funds appropriated under section 776, make grants to eli-
gible entities to establish sustainability programs to design 
and implement sustainability practices including in the 
areas of energy management, green building, waste man-
agement, purchasing, transportation, and toxics manage-
ment, and other aspects of sustainability that integrate 
campus operations with multidisciplinary academic pro-
grams and are applicable to the private and government 
sectors. 
‘‘(b) PERIOD OF GRANT.—The provision of payments 
under a grant under subsection (a) may extend over a pe-
riod of not more than 4 fiscal years. 
‘‘(c) DEFINITION OF ELIGIBLE ENTITIES.—For pur-
poses of this part, the term ‘eligible entity’ means— 
‘‘(1) an institution of higher education that 
grants 2 or 4-year undergraduate degrees, or mas-
ters and doctoral degrees, or both; or 
‘‘(2) a non-profit consortia, association, alli-
ance, or collaboration operating in partnership with 
one or more institutions of higher education that re-
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ceived funds for the implementation of work associ-
ated with sustainability programs under this part. 
‘‘SEC. 772. APPLICATIONS. 
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—To receive a grant under section 
771(a), an eligible entity shall submit an application to 
the Secretary at such time, in such form, and containing 
such information as the Secretary may reasonably require. 
‘‘(b) ASSURANCES.—Such application shall include 
assurances that the eligible entity— 
‘‘(1) has developed or shall develop a plan, in-
cluding an evaluation component, for the program 
component established pursuant to section 773; 
‘‘(2) shall use Federal funds received from a 
grant under section 771(a) to supplement, not sup-
plant, non-Federal funds that would otherwise be 
available for projects funded under such section; 
‘‘(3) shall provide, with respect to any fiscal 
year in which such entity receives funds from a 
grant under section 771(a), non-Federal funds or an 
in-kind contribution in an amount equal to 20 per-
cent of funds from such grant, for the purpose of 
carrying out the program component established in 
section 773; and 
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