Institutions in the University System of Georgia need to collect more data on the amount of energy they use and set benchmarks for energy conservation, a University-led task force told the Board of Regents on Wednesday.

University President Michael Adams, the leader of the task force studying energy, presented the plan on Wednesday to the regents at their monthly meeting in Atlanta.

“I think if the plan is formally adopted by the board, there is so much data that will be reported and there will be transparency in the system,” said Tom Adams, a member of the task force and a member of the University’s engineering outreach faculty. “The natural way we do business in the system” will force improvement, he said.

The report, Tom Adams said, is comprehensive. It gives specific dollar amounts that the institutions expect improving energy conservation to cost.

“It was thought that in order to be sustainable it would be very expensive for the campuses, but the opposite was shown to be true,” he said. “It’s a real win-win for everybody.”

Tom Adams said the strength of the report’s recommendations lies in a new level of oversight, including a committee on energy conservation and an energy conservation coordinator for each school.

Many colleges and universities already practice environmental sustainability, he said, and ideas from the eight schools on the task force contributed to the report’s suggestions.

Ken Crowe, director of energy services for the University’s physical plant and a member of the task force, said the University conducts energy audits on its buildings to determine where improvements can be made.

“We’ve really been doing a lot with energy for the last 10 years or so,” Crowe said. “It’s pretty telling that energy use on a square foot basis has really declined over the last 15 years or so.”

The task force began in December 2006 and completed the report in April 2007, Tom Adams said.

He said the report also recommends efficient climate control, use of rainwater harvesting and other green building initiatives.

In other business, the regents approved a change in the system-wide grade point average policy that will round student cumulative GPAs to the hundredth decimal place rather than the tenth place, regents spokesperson Diane Payne said.

The regents also approved six new professorships at the University, which will be funded by private donations.