Energy
Energy use is one of our most significant environmental impacts.
Power
Nearly 50% of Newcastle University’s total carbon footprint is emitted through the supply of heating, cooling and power to our buildings. The University is paying over £10 million per year in utility bills alone.
Effective energy management and investing in energy efficiency, conservation, generation, and awareness measures are all crucial for achieving our goal of Net Zero by 2030.
Check campus building energy performance
Display Energy Certificates (DECs) are designed to show the energy performance of public buildings. They use a scale that runs from 'A' to 'G' - 'A' being the most efficient and 'G' being the least.
You can check the DECs and related recommendation reports for University campus buildings on the Government's website. Please note, this website is still in Beta form and shows expired as well as valid certificates for some buildings.
What you can do
Read on for advice on saving energy in a variety of campus spacesand email us in the Sustainability Team if you find areas where you believe energy is being wasted!
Heating and cooling
The University spends in excess of £5 million on heating and cooling buildings. Our buildings are equipped with sensors and automatic heating and cooling systems to keep conditions at the required comfort levels. Additionally, we are investing in a number of energy saving projects, including a programme of control upgrades which will make the systems more efficient.
- Optimum office temperature is typically 19°C to 21°C
- Legal minimum temperature for offices is 16°C
- Comfort cooling should not be set to come on below 25°C
- 1°C reduction in room temperature can save 6 to 8 percent on heating costs and CO2 emissions.
- Air conditioned buildings use about twice as much energy as naturally ventilated ones – even small 'comfort cooling' systems are energy intensive to run.
More detail can be found in the Heating and Cooling Policy for Non-Residential Buildings (PDF: 229KB) for academic, research and office buildings. For student accommodation, see the link to the Residences Heating Policy under Policy Information.
Projects requiring cooling
The refrigerants used in AC systems can have a global warming potential thousands of times greater than that of CO2. The University aims to limit the use of air conditioning due to its high costs and environmental impact. The installation of new AC systems is subject to an assessment and approval process. We recognise that internal temperatures must be tightly controlled for some applications such as temperature sensitive research equipment. But we won't normally accept requests for comfort cooling. Estates & Facilities will work with units to assess alternative approaches to achieving thermal comfort for occupants.
Please fill out the AC and Cooling Case Assessment form (Word: 31KB) if you have a project that may require cooling, and return the completed form to sustainable.campus@ncl.ac.uk.
Energy saving actions
- Close doors and windows when heating and air conditioning is on:
- Report doors and windows that do not seal correctly when closed to Estates and Facilities on ext. 87171 or ess-helpdesk@newcastle.ac.uk
- Report doors and windows that do not seal correctly when closed to Estates and Facilities on ext. 87171 or ess-helpdesk@newcastle.ac.uk
- Dress appropriately for the weather conditions:
- As we all feel cold to different degrees, a great way to maximise personal comfort is to wear the most appropriate clothing for you.
- Familiarise yourself with local heating controls:
- Some office radiators have thermostatic radiator valves (TRVs) which you can alter.
- Do not use portable electric heaters:
- Electric heaters are not only expensive to run but are also responsible for greater CO2 emissions. If your work area is too cold (typically lower than 19°C) report this to Estates and Facilities on ext. 87171 or ess-helpdesk@newcastle.ac.uk, and the issue can be investigated.
- Ensure that heating and cooling systems are not running at the same time.
- Report heating issues:
- If you think there may be a fault with the heating or cooling systems in your area, report it to Estates and Facilities on ext. 87171 or ess-helpdesk@newcastle.ac.uk
Electrical appliances
Lighting
Lighting accounts for around 20% of University energy use.
Because of this, we are currently underway with our campus-wide LED lighting scheme to replace all old halogen and compact fluorescent lights with new LED like-for-like replacements.
We are also introducing new lighting controls, and recommissioning existing control infrastructure.
Energy Saving Actions
For areas without automatic control, turning off lights when they are not required, making good use of natural light, and ensuring that broken lighting is reported promptly are all vitally important. It may be useful to discuss who is usually last in the office and establish responsibility for turning off lights at the end of the day. Additionally, labelling banks of light switches can reduce energy use by assisting colleagues in only using the lights they need.
Computers
We work with our IT Service on energy saving projects, such as automatic shutdown of cluster computers after 30 minutes of inactivity. Technical solutions are more complicated for staff computers, making simple behavioural changes especially important.
Energy Saving Actions
Turn off your PC and monitors at the end of the day: A standard PC with one monitor uses around 140 watts of energy per hour when switched on, 42 watts when in standby, and only 5 watts when shut down.
So, turning off your PC at the end of the day will save 88% of its power consumption as compared to leaving it in standby overnight!
Buying a new PC
Generally, it’s most sustainable to keep your current laptop/ PC for as long as possible due to the embodied carbon and rare materials needed to manufacture computers. For the same reasons, it’s always best to see if computers can be repaired rather than replaced – this is often a lot cheaper too!
However, computers will need replacing from time to time if they’re having issues that are slowing down your work process significantly or posing any kind of health and safety issues. Buying a new computer doesn’t have to cost the Earth, though, and Ethical Consumer have a nice guide on what to look for to make sustainable and ethical technology purchases.
Additionally, see the guidance from our Purchasing Team on how best to ensure that your procurement is sustainable.
Zip boilers
A Zip boiler unit for hot drinks uses a third of the energy of electric kettles and these efficiency improvements only increase with higher usage. Zip boilers also save water by providing only as much as is needed on demand.
If you don't have a Zip boiler for hot drinking water, email sustainable-campus@ncl.ac.uk.
Laboratories
There are many energy-intensive pieces of equipment on campus. Particularly, our technical spaces, including natural and medical sciences laboratories and engineering workshops, utilise lots of high energy specialist hardware, such as fume cupboards, drying cabinets, and fridges/ freezers.
In fact, if we split Newcastle University's buildings into technical, and non-technical, then the technical spaces account for nearly 60% of Scope 1 and 2 CO2 emissions, but less than 45% of our total estate area.
There are many ways to decrease energy usage in laboratories, and guidance for colleagues can be found here. One excellent course of action to embed lasting change would be to work through the criteria of the Laboratory Efficiency Assessment Framework (LEAF) and join the host of Newcastle University labs with LEAF awards for sustainability!
The University is implementing many energy efficiency improvements like changing light fittings to LEDs, upgrading inefficient equipment and installing PIRs for automatic switching off. You can find out more about projects like this on our Energy and Carbon pages.
However, there are lots of ways that you can help the University to reduce its energy consumption through your work in an office, teaching space, catering outlet or laboratory. Some examples of actions you can take are having someone to do a final sweep of your workplace to ensure that equipment that can be switched off, is switched off. You can also change the way equipment is used in your workplace to make it more efficient. You can find guidance on our sustainability action scheme for staff, Action 2020, where you can complete guided actions. We're very happy to chat to you about this and provide some guidance, feel free to email us at sustainable-campus@newcastle.ac.uk.
Exerpt from the latest iteration of the Heating and Cooling Policy for Non-Residential Buildings:
"Supplementary electric heaters are inefficient, environmentally damaging and can pose a significant fire risk. Electric heaters use significant amounts of energy, resulting in additional CO2 emissions, and shall only be used in exceptional circumstances (e.g. heating faults) under the direction of ESS.
Electric heaters can also ‘trick’ the BMS into thinking the building temperature is sufficient and switch off the heating to the relevant heating zone, which potentially covers large areas of the building. In exceptional circumstances, outside the heating season, where internal temperatures are recorded below 19°C for a significant period, temporary heating may be appropriate as a last resort. Any temporary electric heaters must be Portable Appliance Tested, and for safety reasons only thermostatically controlled oil-filled radiators shall be used.
Units must liaise with ESS to ensure that any temporary heating can be operated safely i.e. preventing overloading of local electrical circuits. For safety reasons electric heaters must not be left switched on in unoccupied rooms, and must not, under any circumstances, be left on out of hours."
The heating and cooling of University buildings is controlled by Building Management Systems (BMS). For more detailed information about the BMS and how it is monitored and used, see the Heating and Cooling Policy for Non-Residential Buildings.