Carbon Offsets

1.1 SCOPE: The State University of New York at Buffalo (“University”) will contract with one (1) contractor for the purchase of high quality ozone depleting substances carbon offsets (“offsets”). This Request for Proposal (“RFP”) contains information and instructions to enable interested firms to prepare and submit proposals and accompanying material. Firms must submit a complete proposal that satisfies all the requirements as stated in this RFP and provide all information as requested. 1.2 BACKGROUND The University at Buffalo (“University”) is the largest and most comprehensive campus in the 64-campus State University of New York system (“SUNY”). Founded in 1846, the University is a premier research-intensive public university dedicated to academic excellence. The University offers a wide range of academic programs including more than 100 undergraduate degrees, 205 master’s degrees and 94 doctoral and professional degrees. Currently there are more than 260,000 alumni taking leadership roles in communities and businesses throughout the United States, 135,000 in New York State, and in 148 countries around the world. Approximately 30,000 students attend the University. The University is a member in the prestigious Association of American Universities (“AAU”). The University understands the existential threat that climate change poses to our institution, region, state, country, and planet. That is why we have doubled down on our commitment to become climate neutral within the next decade. To achieve this, we are standing on the shoulders of five decades of environmental leadership and focusing our climate action work on a holistic solutions orientated approach. UB’s 10-in-10 strategy is our roadmap of 10 innovative, engaging and digestible steps we are advancing to increase climate action throughout the university and put us on a path to net zero emissions by 2030 (Leveraging Offsets for Challenging Emissions is one of these key initiatives). The strategy is holistic, inclusive, engages our broader community, and leverages both a triple bottom line approach as well as the Sustainable Development Goals. Embedded in this plan are key Integrators of climate justice, resiliency and leveraging the academic work of our university. After launching the 10-in-10 climate action plan, the University consulted with many organizations on their carbon offset procurement experiences. These ranged from fellow institutions of higher education, carbon offset rating agencies, carbon offset experts, carbon offset developers and others. At the beginning of this journey, the University wanted to ensure that carbon offsets purchased generated robust co-benefits to the communities around them. However, after extensive conversations with national peers it was learned that these types of offsets were typically not of a high quality, and most importantly, their additionality was difficult to claim which would provide an undue level or risk to the University. UB then assessed several rating scales focused on identifying a sector of high quality offsets that can easily, and transparently, be quantified in their direct impact and withstand strong third party verification. Through this analysis it was determined that offsets that originate from projects that destroy ozone depleting substances (see section 2.2) offers the University the best value. Offsets of this type have a high standard and quality, and leveraging them also reinforces higher education leadership in fostering this nascent market solution. The University will generate co-benefits through other carbon sequestration work it is advancing such as working to advance the development of a regional and community offset initiative and more direct campus work that includes food recovery and leveraging nature based solutions. The specific scope of emissions the University will offset through this RFP is focused directly on UB’s Scope 1 and 2 emissions. Through the development of clean energy master plans and a transition plan for electrifying its fleet, the University has created a pathway for decarbonizing the emissions. These scopes typically emit 30,000 to 45,000MTCDE annually.