Newcastle University

The Eco Campus Environmental Management System (EMS) - specially designed for the Higher and Further Education sector - has been in operation on campus since last summer.

It helps to reduce the environmental impact of our activities and also provides recognition for efforts made towards achieving environmental sustainability as part of Vision 2021.

“All of the services and activities on campus have an environmental impact – from what we purchase to how we tackle pollution,” said waste manager Daniel O’Connor. “Eco Campus provides a framework for managing our environmental impact and enables us to build on existing good practice to bring about continuous environmental improvement.”

The University secured a bronze award last year and the target is gold for 2011 and platinum the following year. The University will be externally audited at each stage as we progress towards increased environmental sustainability.

Tony Stevenson, Pro-Vice Chancellor for Planning and Resources, said: “We've worked really hard in achieving our silver award and I want to thank staff and students for all their support. We have already started working towards the gold award and this is where the really hard work of fully integrating environmental management into our day-to-day operations at the University begins.”

For more information about the University’s sustainability strategy, visit the ESS Environmental Sustainability website.

* Related news: Newcastle is the first city to achieve first place in the Green City league table for the second year running.  The city council stressed that success had come through co-operation in the region, not least with the universities. 

Among the initiatives which helped the city secure its prime spot was the bee strategy which was developed with experts from the University's School of Biology.  For further information, please see the Guardian newspaper article.