Greater Lansing Life, Fishing and fastballs

Greater Pride

With Michigan State University playing such a prominent role in the Greater Lansing region, it’s easy for us to think green and white. But we’re thinking green in other ways as well:

  • Capital Area Transportation Authority (CATA) was the first transit system in Michigan to add full-sized hybrid diesel-electric buses to its fleet. CATA, which now has 10 hybrid buses on the road, is gradually converting to an all-hybrid fleet as old buses are retired.
  • The Lansing Board of Water & Light operates the state’s largest solar array—a 432-panel installation on South Cedar Street that furnishes enough electricity to power about 50 homes. BWL’s goal is to have seven percent of retail electric sales come from renewable energy sources by 2016.
  • Granger recovers the methane gas produced when waste decomposes at its landfills in Grand Ledge and Lansing—at four other Michigan landfills—and uses it to produce some 6.4 megawatts of electricity each year. That’s enough to power 4,000 homes. Recovering the gas also prevents it from escaping into the atmosphere and contributing to global warming.
  • DeWitt’s Draft House is one of just four restaurants in Michigan—and one of about 150 in the United States and Canada—to be certified “green” by the National Green Restaurant Association. Among other things, the restaurant has instituted a comprehensive recycling program, increased its energy and water conservation efforts and serves seafood from sustainable fisheries only.
  • MSU’s High Performance Computing Center ranks 43rd on the Green500TM List of the world’s most energy-efficient supercomputers.
  • Christman Company’s headquarters in downtown Lansing’s former Mutual Building was the first building in the world to receive two platinum certifications from the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) program. The energy-efficient headquarters will save the company an estimated $40,000 a year in energy costs.
  • General Motors’s Lansing Delta Township plant was the first assembly plant on the planet to earn LEED gold certification. The plant is the only building in our region—and one of just 350 in the world—with LEED gold certification.
  • East Lansing each year hosts Project Pride, a citywide effort to collect recyclables. Of the 49 tons of material collected in 2008, 16 tons were reused by local charities, 26 tons were recycled, and just seven tons were thrown away. The city also collected almost 11 tons of electronics, including old TVs, computers, and microwaves.
  • MSU’s Pack Up, Pitch In program collects recyclable, reusable commodities from students as they leave campus each summer. Since the program’s inception in 1996, local charities have received more than 120,000 pounds of clothing and shoes, more than 300,000 pounds of non-perishable food, and more than 10,000 square yards of loft lumber.
  • Students at Lansing’s Woodcreek Magnet School compost their leftover fruit, vegetables, and bread by feeding the scraps to worms housed in large outdoor bins. The worms digest the scraps and produce a nutrient-rich fertilizer called vermicompost. Woodcreek students worked with seniors from MSU’s Department of Mechanical Engineering and East Lansing’s Urban Options to create a solar-heated system after their worms froze in 2005.
  • Lansing is one of the largest cities in the country to take its drinking water supply entirely from groundwater. The water comes from 118 wells that tap into an underground aquifer.
  • Sleepy Hollow State Park in Laingsburg has reduced its impact on the planet by reducing the need to mow park grounds, using biodiesel, switching from gas to electric maintenance vehicles, installing used playground equipment and using compact fluorescent light bulbs and outdoor solar lighting. The park, which offers recycling for park visitors, also uses biological controls to moderate the growth of invasive plants in the lake.
  • Lansing, East Lansing, and Meridian Township signed the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement, under which they committed to reducing their energy use from 1990 levels by 7 percent by 2012.
  • Lansing’s Friedland Industries has been a recycling leader for more than 120 years. The company saves local landfill space by collecting, processing, and brokering more than 200 million pounds of batteries, cardboard, electronics, metal, paper, and plastics each year.
  • Lansing’s Insty-Prints Downtown has recycled more than 50 tons of paper and cardboard—as well as industrial ink cartridges—in the past 10 years. A process used to safeguard the environment renders their printing chemicals inert.
  • MSU’s Biomass Conversion Research Laboratory is leading efforts to find efficient, cost-effective and environmentally attractive ways to convert our nation’s biomass—livestock waste, municipal waste and plants—into needed fuels, chemicals and other materials. Right now, we rely on fossil resources like petroleum to do this. More than 60 percent of our petroleum is imported.
  • Lansing has been working since 1992 to separate some 203 miles of combined stormwater and sewage pipes that can cause sewage to overflow into rivers during times of heavy rainfall. The city’s Michigan Avenue Rain Gardens are just one part of this Combined Sewer Overflow.
  • The Granger Recycling Center on Wood Road in Lansing processes 50 to 70 tons of recyclable materials each day. Its public drop-off center is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
  • East Lansing participates in Michigan’s ROOT (Restoration of Our Trees), an effort to replace trees destroyed by the Emerald Ash Borer. Since 2007, the program has resulted in the planting of 300 new trees in the community.
  • The Greater Lansing Area Clean Cities program provides resources for voluntary, community-based programs to reduce consumption of petroleum-based fuels and improve air quality and energy security in our region. Since its establishment in 1993, Clean Cities has displaced the use of more than 1.6 billion gallons of petroleum.
  • Michigan was the second state to join the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, a national effort to get states, non-profits and businesses to commit to using more efficient computer equipment. The move is expected to save the state $955,000 by spring 2009 and reduce its carbon footprint by producing approximately 9,000 fewer tons of carbon dioxide each year.

Greater Lansing: Citius, Altius, Fortius

With the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing taking place in August, we’re reminded of the Olympic motto: Citius, Altius, Fortius—or Faster, Higher, Stronger. It’s always nice to be #1, and the Greater Lansing region is noteworthy for a number of firsts and bests. They include the following:

  • The Christman Company’s downtown Lansing headquarters is the first building in the world to receive two platinum certifications from the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) program. The energy-efficient building will save the company an estimated $40,000 a year in energy costs.
  • Clinton County is the state’s #1 mint producer and among the top mint producers in the country. Mint oil is used in a variety of products, including candy, cough drops, shampoo, toothpaste—and, of course, chewing gum. A single pound of mint oil will flavor 135,000 sticks of gum.
  • Emergent BioSolutions’ BioThrax® is the first—and only—anthrax vaccine approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
  • Lansing native Alexa Canady was the first African-American woman to practice neurosurgery in the United States. Canady, who is among the nation’s top pediatric neurosurgeons, was director of neurosurgery at Children's Hospital of Michigan in Detroit and a professor at Wayne State University until 2001.
  • Lansing’s Ransom Eli Olds—the founder of Oldsmobile—was the first person to mass-produce automobiles. He also invented the gas-powered lawn mower.
  • East Lansing became the nation’s first municipality to adopt a gay rights antidiscrimination measure when it did so in 1972.
  • Lansing’s Thomas M. Cooley Law School is the largest law school in the United States.
  • MSU’s record of Rhodes Scholars—now at 16—has led the Big Ten for 25 years.

Greater Lansing: Acting local, thinking global

Did you know the Greater Lansing region’s reach extends around the globe? We’re smack in the middle of America’s heartland, but area companies ship their products and services worldwide, and area colleges and universities send their students and scholars almost everywhere. In all, our region’s reach extends to more than 130 different countries:

  • TechSmith Corporation’s software products, including Camtasia Studio® and SnagIt®, are sold in 30 countries and are available in five languages.
  • Web hosting provider LiquidWeb Inc. provides its products, including Windows and Linux dedicated servers and virtual private servers, to companies in more than 100 countries worldwide.
  • General Motors Corporation sells its vehicles in almost every country in the world, and Lansing-built GM vehicles are shipped to 43 different countries. General Motors had its second-best global sales year ever in 2007, setting records in China, India and other countries.
  • Spartan Motors provides key chassis components for the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) armored vehicles used to protect U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Demmer Corporation also builds key components for a number of military vehicles.
  • IDV Solutions’ data visualization products are used by major corporations like British Petroleum and Reuters to track and respond to world events.
  • Capital City Airport was recently designated a U.S. Port of Entry, which will allow the airport to handle international flights for the first time. The airport will open a permanent customs facility by 2009.
  • Michigan State University and Lansing Community College’s study-abroad programs are among the largest in the United States – more than 3,000 students from the two schools studied in more than 60 countries on all continents during the 2006-2007 year.

Wow! That's Lansing!

Just look around! Our region’s rich history – and a host of current happenings – gives us tons to talk about. Make it your mission to share some of our points of pride with other people:

  • The Greater Lansing region is home to five of the fastest growing private companies in the country: FinCor Holdings, ICS Marketing Support Services, Liquid Web, TechSmith Corporation, and Two Men and a Truck.
  • Ingham County residents are among the most tech-savvy in the country, according to a USA TODAY study. Some 42 percent are so-called “early adopters” of the latest technology – well above the national average of 29 percent.
  • Lansing suburb Haslett is one of BusinessWeek’s 50 best places in America to raise children. The Lansing suburb came in 42nd; Douglas (23rd) and Galesburg (49th) were the only other Michigan cities to make the list.
  • Stevie Wonder was trained in classical piano at Lansing’s Michigan School for the Blind. Wonder, who was born in Saginaw and raised in Detroit, has recorded more than 30 top 10 hits and won 25 Grammy Awards – a record for a solo artist.
  • The Lansing-built Cadillac CTS is Motor Trend’s 2008 Car of the Year, topping a field of 18 contenders that included the Audi TT, the Honda Accord, the Mercedes-Benz C-Class, the Mini Cooper and the Scion xB.
  • Our region is a hub of finance and insurance activity – and home to seven major insurance carriers (Accident Fund, Auto-Owners, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, Delta Dental of Michigan, Farm Bureau Insurance of Michigan, Jackson National Life, and Michigan Millers).
  • Michigan State University’s nuclear research program ranks 2nd only to MIT’s.

Have we missed something you like to brag about? To submit your own points of pride, tell us.

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