“Diverse measures and activities” are being undertaken, according to European University Association
A survey of hundreds of higher education institutions across Europe has found that most are acting to improve their environmental sustainability.
“Higher education institutions are really key actors in carbon neutrality and sustainable societies,” said Michael Gaebel, director of the European University Association’s higher education policy unit and a co-author of the survey report published on 16 September.
Gaebel and EUA colleagues Henriette Stöber and Alison Morrisroe gathered responses from 372 higher education institutions from the European Higher Education Area, 305 (64 per cent) of which said that they had ‘greening’ measures and initiatives in place across the institution.
Another 18 per cent of respondents reported greening measures led by individual departments or faculties, while 14 per cent said they were planning on taking up such measures in the future or interested in doing so.
Diverse measures
According to the report, universities are addressing greening “through a large range of diverse measures and activities”. For instance, 80-90 per cent of the 305 institutions with greening activities reported were acting on mobility, through initiatives such as providing digital tools for remote working or providing low-carbon transportation.
While the authors noted that approaches such as virtual learning or teleconferencing “do not really come as a surprise given the ongoing pandemic”, they said that many institutions plan on continuing these activities beyond Covid-19.
About 70 per cent of the greening institutions reported that this included research and innovation activities, such as specific funding for green R&D or trying to reduce the environmental footprint of laboratory activities.
Widespread action
Gaebel told Research Professional News he was impressed with the amount of feedback and the fact that “so many institutions already had greening or sustainable development goals already in place” despite the fact that “in most places this is not necessarily something that has been expected of institutions or that they would be assessed on”.
Respondents included institutions in and outside the EU, in countries including Armenia, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan. Gaebel said the information gathered was not granular enough to do a country-by-country analysis, but that he hoped it could help boost green issues in future EUA work.
“Whatever we do in the future, it will have issues of greening built in,” he said.