It’s great to be writing my first entry as a guest writer for the People and Planet blog. I have been involved with P&P since my first year at York in 1998, and was behind the development of the Go Green campaign back in the autumn of 2003, after I completed my MSc in environmental impact assessment, auditing and management systems. I have kept a hand in the campaign, and university environmental management, ever since.

I now write for The ENDS Report , the world’s oldest environmental business and policy publication. I am also a trustee of my local sustainable development charity Sustainable Merton and sit a member of Transition Town Wimbledon, so I was really happy to hear about the new Going Greener: Transition Unis campaign.

HEFCE – the major funding body for higher education in England – together with sector bodies Universities UK and GuildHE is currently consulting on plans to cut universities’ greenhouse gas emissions.

English universities are thought to emit around greenhouse gases equivalent to 3.3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide each year. This amount is around half a percent of the UK’s total, and has risen by a third since 1990.

The consultation has been released as a consequence of last year’s Climate Change Act, which committed the UK to a 34% cut in emissions by 2020 and 80% by 2050. HEFCE’s draft strategy expects the sector to go beyond these, by halving its emissions from electricity use and from on-site combustion, such as from boilers and combined heat & power plants (CHPs), by 2020. They should be eliminated by 2050.

HEFCE says that, sensibly enough, universities should emphasize energy efficiency, rolling out increased renewable generation and CHPs, together with changing staff and student behavior. These should achieve a 2.5 megatonne cut alone.

Each institution will have to produce a carbon management plan, stating how emissions reductions should be achieved and resourced. These will have to be approved by governing bodies and annual reports published (which will no doubt be a goldmine for the Green League).

The consultation also proposes linking capital funding to carbon performance – which will surely attract the interest of those who hold the purse strings.

All of this is, superficially at least, wonderful news and the cuts seem eminently achievable – partly due to the improved basic environmental management delivered by the Go Green campaign. But with these things there is always a but. The targets do not include missions associated with procurement and targets for transport emissions have not been set.

The framework is also rather loose – I cannot see how HEFCE can guarantee that the cuts will be delivered in time. Its approach is much less hands-on than its Welsh equivalent HEFCW (pronounced heff-coo).

Last year, HEFCW required all higher education institutions to develop externally certified environmental management systems by 2010 – a step beyond the demands of Go Green. The Welsh Assembly Government also provided £3 million in grants to boost electricity and water sub-metering two years ago, to help institutions find out where and when they are being consumed.

The deadline for responses – 16 October is approaching swiftly. Make sure that your university responds!

So, all in all, the draft strategy is a bit of a curate’s egg, but certainly welcome nonetheless – and still leaves plenty of room for student campaigning. Onwards, Transition Universities!

Tags: climate, Climate Change Act, England, HEFCE, HEFCW, Wales

This entry was posted on Monday, October 5th, 2009 at 11:50 pm and is filed under Environmental Issues, In The News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.