I 
109TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 3284 
To direct the Secretary of Education to provide grants to establish sustain-
ability programs, charged with developing and implementing integrated 
environmental, economic, and social sustainability initiatives through ad-
ministrative and operational practices as well as multidisciplinary re-
search, education, and outreach at institutions of higher education. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JULY 14, 2005 
Mr. BLUMENAUER (for himself, Mr. WU, and Mr. EHLERS) introduced the fol-
lowing bill; which was referred to the Committee on Education and the 
Workforce 
A BILL 
To direct the Secretary of Education to provide grants to 
establish sustainability programs, charged with devel-
oping and implementing integrated environmental, eco-
nomic, and social sustainability initiatives through ad-
ministrative and operational practices as well as multi-
disciplinary research, education, and outreach at institu-
tions of higher education. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Higher Education Sus-
tainability Act of 2005’’. 
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 future progress requires the 
simultaneous achievement of a well functioning envi-
ronmental system, economic viability that creates 
new jobs and livable communities that provide access 
to all for participation in their governance. 
(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 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. 
(6) The Nation’s higher education institutions 
also are uniquely positioned to prepare the future 
labor force for addressing threats to, and seeking 
opportunities for economic, environmental, and so-
cial sustainability. 
(7) 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. 
(8) 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. 
(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 
both administrative and educational sustainability 
programs on campus; 
(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: 
‘‘PART E—UNIVERSITY SUSTAINABILITY 
PROGRAMS 
‘‘SEC. 771. PROGRAM AUTHORIZED. 
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—The Secretary shall make grants 
to eligible entities to establish sustainability programs to 
design and implement sustainability practices including in 
the areas of energy management, green building, waste 
management, purchasing, transportation, and toxics man-
agement, and other aspects of sustainability that integrate
campus operations with multidisciplinary educational 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 as a partnership of 
such an institution with other such institutions. 
‘‘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 
‘‘(4) shall collaborate with business, govern-
ment, and the nonprofit sectors in the development 
and implementation of its sustainability plan. 
‘‘SEC. 773. USE OF FUNDS. 
‘‘Grants made under section 771 may be used by an 
eligible entity for the following purposes: 
‘‘(1) To develop and implement administrative 
and operations practices at institutions of higher 
education that test, model, and analyze principles of 
sustainability. 
‘‘(2) To establish multidisciplinary education, 
research, and outreach programs at institutions of 
higher education that address the environmental, so-
cial, and economic dimensions of sustainability.
‘‘(3) To support research and teaching initia-
tives that focus on multidisciplinary and integrated 
environmental, economic, and social elements. 
‘‘(4) To establish initiatives in the areas of en-
ergy management, green building, waste manage-
ment, purchasing, toxics management, transpor-
tation, and other aspects of sustainability. 
‘‘(5) To support student, faculty, and staff 
work at institutions of higher education to imple-
ment, research, and evaluate sustainable practices. 
‘‘(6) To conduct faculty, staff and/or adminis-
trator trainings on the subjects of sustainability and 
institutional change. 
‘‘(7) To compile, evaluate and disseminate best 
practices, case studies, guidelines and standards. 
‘‘(8) To conduct efforts to engage external 
stakeholders such as business, alumni, and accred-
iting agencies in the process of building support for 
research, education and technology development for 
sustainability. 
‘‘SEC. 774. REPORTS. 
‘‘An eligible entity that receives a grant under section 
section 771(a) shall submit to the Secretary, for each fis-
cal year in which the entity receives amounts from such 
grant, a report that describes the work conducted pursu-
ant to section 773, research findings and publications, ad-
ministrative savings experienced, and an evaluation of the 
program. 
‘‘SEC. 775. ALLOCATION REQUIREMENT. 
‘‘The Secretary may not make grants under section 
771(a) to any eligible entity in a total amount that is less 
than $500,000 or more than $2,000,000. 
‘‘SEC. 776. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. 
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—There is authorized to be appro-
priated to carry out section 771(a), $50,000,000 for fiscal 
year 2006 and such sums as may be necessary for each 
of the 5 succeeding fiscal years. 
‘‘(b) AVAILABILITY.—Amounts appropriated under 
subsection (a) are authorized to remain available until ex-
pended.’’. 
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