Exactly 11 months ago today, I started work as the Environmental Co-ordinator Support Officer in Newcastle University’s Sustainability Team. My role was to support the network of over 70 Environmental Co-ordinators (ECs) in meeting sustainability objectives, in accordance with our Environmental Management System (EMS), EcoCampus.

Throughout my employment, I have had the opportunity to work with a variety of staff and students, on a variety of sustainability issues, ranging from recycling and waste, to energy efficiency, to biodiversity. The one part of my role that provided the most enjoyable experiences is the communications – actively engaging staff, students, University stakeholders and the wider community in how Newcastle University is reducing the impact its operations has on the environment. Through pioneering campaigns, community outreach and targeted marketing, the last year has seen the profile of the work undertaken by the team and the ECs increase, and awareness of environmental sustainability issues, campus facilities and local achievements has risen.

I leave today a better person for spending my time in this role. I have learnt so much; from energy management, to waste legislation, to communication skills. I go away with a wealth of experience in project management, targeted communications and technical aspects of environmental sustainability issues and solutions.

Of course, my job would not have anywhere near as exciting were it not for my fabulous colleagues. Their continued support on new ideas, kindness on hard days, and wonderful personalities have made Newcastle University a lovely place to work. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time in the Estate Support Service, and have made some excellent friends. I am proud to have worked alongside my team mates, and feel greatly appreciative of all they have taught me. I will miss them all and my days certainly will not be the same without them.

Today is my last day, and I have been treated like a queen – my lovely work colleagues have showered me with gifts (posh chocolate – they know me so well!) and my superb student intern, Siobhan, gave me an amazing bouquet of flowers. I am so lucky to have had such a cracking bunch of people to work with.

So a final thankyou to everyone at Newcastle University – I have truly loved my time here and am very sad to be leaving. I wish everyone in the Estate Support Service and all the ECs, the best of luck going forward – remember; be sustainable!

From our last post, you can see that the Sustainability Team are award winners on our own turf – but send us to the big smoke and you get a lot of very stiff competition!

When we entered the Business Green Leaders Awards 2011, we thought we’d be very lucky to even get through to the next stage – in a nationwide hunt for the Sustainability Team of the Year, it would be challenging for us to get noticed amongst large corporations. But the efforts of the team, the ECs, and all University stakeholders in reducing our environmental impacts impressed the judges, and we were shortlisted for the award.

It was such an honour to have been recognised as one of the top 6 Sustainability Teams in the UK. But now we had that thirst for glory – could we win?! We had very worthy competition in the form of the Yorkshire Ambulance Service, Archant, BAE Systems, E.ON UK, and RS Consulting.

The awards evening was held in London, and was an ideal opportunity for Newcastle University to network and promote their efforts, raising the University’s profile in the sustainability and environmental sectors.

As it was a team award, as many members of the 8 strong Sustainably Team attended the event. Off to the big smoke we went, five of us cramped into a car (car sharing – sustainable method of transport!). The black tie awards event was a great evening, hosted by Jeremy Hardy, from Radio 4, with a lovely three course meal.

Lucy Latham, Carbon Emissions Officer, and Kay Gregory, EC Support Officer, sit down to dinner, with the stage in the background.

With Daniel ‘Waste Manager’ O’Connor practicing his W sign (W for Winner! see pic below), how could we lose?! But, despite Lucy ‘Carbon Emissions Officer’ Latham’s pre-written acceptance speech, we were unsuccessful. We lost out on the award for Sustainability Team of the Year to Yorkshire Ambulance Service’s Carbon Management Team.

Many congratulations to all the winners. You can find out more about the other awards, at http://ev785.eventive.incisivecms.co.uk/static/shortlist

Kay, with Dan O’Connor, Waste Manager (making the W sign!), Hannah Munro, Sustainability Support Officer, and Matt Dunlop, Energy Manager.

Regardless of the evening’s outcomes, we’d like to thank all the University’s Environmental Co-ordinators, and all University staff and students for their continued efforts in assisting the Sustainability Team to reduce the impact of the University’s operations on the environment. To be shortlisted for the award means the University as a whole has been recognised as achieving success in its aim to become environmentally sustainable, and that achievement would not occur without the help and support of ECs and University staff / students.

Many thanks.

The second annual Environment Awards were held as part of the ‘Celebrating Success’ event on Monday 20th June 2011 in the Courtyard, to recognise the achievements of our staff and students in striving to reduce the University’s environmental impact. A great time was had by all, with canapes and drinks, as Professor Chris Brink, Vice Chancellor, gave a speech to celebrate the success of University staff. The event also includes the Spotlights awards, presented by Veryan Johnston, Executive Director of HR.

Heads of School and Spotlight awards winners also attended the event.

Professor Tony Stevenson, PVC for Sustainability, chats to Lucy and Rob, Environmental Co-ordinators for Architecture and Geography.

Professor Tony Stevenson, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Sustainability, gave a speech celebrating the University’s achievements in environmental sustainability before announcing the winners, who all received an award made from recycled green glass from Professor Brink.

And the winners are…..

Outstanding individual contribution to reducing the University’s environmental impact (staff) – Clive Gerrard (former EC for ISS and former leader of the University’s Green ICT initiative) for his work on reducing the impact our computers have no the environment. Clive dedicated his award to all the staff in ISS who work on the project.

Outstanding group contribution to reducing the University’s environmental impact (Group/department/ecoteam/business unit) – Van Portering Team for their continued efforts with the furniture re-use scheme, reducing our waste to landfill by re-using our furniture inhouse. Award collected by Van Portering Team Leader Ian Beeby.

Outstanding student contribution to the environment (individual or group) – People and Planet (student network campaigning for environmental protection) for their work in engaging Newcastle University staff and students in environmental awareness. Award collected by P&P member, Matt Wilkinson.

Best environmental initiative – Robinson Library’s Sustainability Day for Year 8 and 9 pupils from Long Benton Community College, run by Sara Bird. The full day event engaged with the pupils on environmental sustainability topics including recycling and saving energy by showcasing the University’s efforts and activities design to get the pupils thinking about the issues the University faces in promoting sustainability. Julia Robinson, David Errington, and Jackie Dunn were also involved in the day.

Best recycling performance – In collaboration with O’Brien’s Waste Management – 16/17 Framlington Place for their recycling rate of 60.3%. Award accepted by Jennifer Molyneux, Head of Facilities Management in ESS, on behalf of the cleaners in this building, Julia Martin and Paula Errington.

And lastly….

Despite the Sustainability Team organising the Environment Awards, the team were shocked when Professor Tony Stevenson presented them with an honorary award for their efforts in reducing the University’s environmental impact by working towards the University’s sustainability objective. The award was accepted by Matt Dunlop (Energy Manager), Hannah Munro (Sustainability Support Officer), Edward Wright (EMS officer) and Kay Gregory (EC Support Officer) on behalf of the rest of the Sustainability Team (George Chambers, Assistant Energy Manager, Daniel O’Connor, Waste Manager, Lucy Latham, Carbon Officer, and James Upstill-Goddard, EMS assistant).

The Sustainability Team would like to thank the Environmental Co-ordinators and EcoTeam members, as well as the cleaning and portering staff for all their hard work in assisting the Sustainability Team to reach its environmental objectives. Without the support and hard work of these staff members, the initiatives and facilities put in place by the team would not be as successful.

Many thanks to all University staff for their efforts in reducing the University’s environment impact – keep up the good work!

Thanks for all the nominations we received. The third annual Environment Awards will take place next year… with a twist!

To mark Climate week (21st – 27th March 2011), Newcastle University’s Sustainability Team have a number of exciting new energy schemes launching;

Traffic light stickers for labs

Although turning things off saves energy, it is not always safe to do so. To avoid unsafe situations in laboratories on campus, the traffic light scheme for switch off stickers was developed, to clearly tell people if they can or cannot turn off the equipment. The stickers are being distributed to all Laboratory Managers on campus this week, and will be implemented by a knowledgeable Laboratory Technician in the near future. Look out for these stickers in a lab near you.

Re-launch of the Switch Off campaign

Switch Off 2010 was a year long communication campaign, educating staff and students on energy use across campus. The aim was to raise awareness of the amount of energy the University wastes, and encourage staff and students to turn off any unnecessary electrical items, such as lights / computers.

The success of this awareness campaign showed just how important individual building users are to energy use on campus. From this campaign, a follow up campaign was developed. This new campaign will visit university buildings, and focus upon the technical aspect of energy. The new sub-metering system has enabled access to building specific energy figures, meaning we can provide a tailor made service to help building users reduce their energy consumption / waste.

It is hoped that this new campaign will bring a shared understanding of the importance of both behavioural change and technical methods in the reduction of the University’s baseload of electricity.

During Climate Week, the Switch Off! campaign is working with the building users in the Herschel building. Keep a look out for Switch Off in a building near you!

Lab audits

As part of the new Switch Off! campaign, lab audits will be undertaken in order to gain a better understanding of the energy use in labs. The audits will identify key areas of unnecessary electrical consumption, such as equipment left on overnight etc. By identifying this activity, it can be highlighted where savings can be made in the two main areas to reduce energy use; behavioural change and technical alterations.

If you would like to know more about any of these initiatives, please email saveit@ncl.ac.uk

Ever wondered about the processes behind composting our food waste?
Well now you can find out.

Siobhan Sherry is a Masters student, studying for her MSc in Environmental Consultancy. She is currently working as the Staff Engagement Intern for the Sustainability Team. One of her many jobs has been to design an educational sign for communicating the processes behind our composting. Siobhan designed the large sign to go on the side of the wooden shed covering the composter. This new sign is now in place and looks fab! The simple storyboard shows interested staff and students the path of an apple core deposited into the food waste bins located in kitchen, to the compost end product.

If you have any ideas of others ways the Sustainability Team can engage staff and students with environmental sustainability, please email us at saveit@ncl.ac.uk

Introducing a new group to Newcastle University and the wider community – Cinema Politica Newcastle will be bringing you an engaging series of evening documentaries covering a host of socio-political and environmental issues.

Cinema Politica is a grassroots media arts organization committed to disseminating cinema that explores stories of under-represented issues and oppressed people of the world. The Newcastle branch was started by Newcastle University students and staff and awarded and initial start up grant by ncl+. The films and events will be screened on campus, in our very own Culture Lab, who very kindly donated their facilities in support of our project. There will be talks by experts on the topic following each film facilitating debate and providing both an informative and stimulating evening.

As members, we all enjoyed the public lectures put on by the University and other local community groups so we decided that we wanted to organize our own film nights with the focus on independent documentaries coupled with participative discussion. After some internet browsing Cinema Politica was discovered and we realised that it was the perfect platform to present these events. We think this venture is particularly significant as very few of these films have been publicly screened in the UK hence creating a very exciting opportunity.

At our first event we will be showing the fantastic yet tragic documentary H2Oil, a film about the Canadian Tar Sands. “H2Oil follows a voyage of discovery, heartbreak and politicization in the stories of those attempting to defend water in Alberta against tar sands expansion.” See the trailer here http://www.h2oildoc.com.

When: 24/02/2011 18.30-20.30
Where: Culture Lab, King’s Walk, Newcastle University, NE1 7RU.
Our events are free to all.

Next month we will be showing a documentary about water wars in order to mark world water day.

For more information on the group, see www.cinemapolitica.org/newcastle and click join to receive further news. Otherwise send an email to sympa@ncl.ac.uk with the text “SUBSCRIBE cinemapolitica [your name]” or join us on Facebook!

The University’s Sustainability Team are looking to create a series of educational films to showcase the recycling processes – i.e., what happens after you put the recycling in the appropriate bin – with the aims of providing knowledge, raising awareness and doing so in a fun manner (not a long boring guidance document). We are looking for keen film makers to create these films, based on our scopes (below). The films are aimed at University staff / students with no prior technical knowledge of the processes, and will go on the Sustainability Team’s website, and here on the blog, as well as being publicised to all staff.

The film makers can have full creative licence, providing the below scope is met in the film, and any ideas meet the target audience / educational expectations (Ideas of film style should be reviewed by the Sustainability Team prior to filming). Some projects will require UK travel – We would reimburse / pay expenses for any travel / hotel costs (UK travel projects only), subsistence, and film making consumables (tapes / dvds etc). The film projects can be undertaken by an individual, or by a team, although only the expenses for 2 people will be paid for UK travel (i.e. additional team members for editing etc are expected to remain at home / university). As a duty of care, a member of the Sustainability Team will need to visit the aforementioned sites across the UK, regardless of these projects. Therefore, the filming can be undertaken with a Sustainability Team member present for assistance. The Sustainability Team is happy to provide a reference for the work.

If you would like to be involved, please email Kay Gregory, on kay.gregory@ncl.ac.uk

We have a number of projects we’d like film students to help us create;

The Life Cycle of an Apple Core / Orange Peel; Food to Garden (campus based).
Short educational film about the lifecycle of the orange peel / apple core etc that staff put in the food waste bins on campus, detailing the process we go through in order to get the compost we then give back to staff for free, as well as include the technical aspects of how the composter works (micro-organisms, varying temperatures, carbon sources etc) and reasons we compost (saves on disposal costs, creates free, local compost, reduces waste to landfill, reduces the University’s environmental impact etc). The full process includes eating, disposal into food waste bin, collection of waste by cleaners, transport of waste by porters to Building Science Yard Rocket Composter, loading of composter with food waste and wooden chips, outcome of immature compost, storage and turning of compost to mature it, staff receive free compost, compost goes on garden, grows pretty flowers. For reference, there is an educational sign to be displayed on the side of the composter shed, to educate staff / students. The film is intended to be of similar content, but with more detail.

The Life Cycle of a Plastic Bottle; a journey through the recycling process of plastic waste (UK travel involved).
Short educational film about the lifecycle of our plastic waste, from the moment a student puts a plastic bottle into the recycling, detailing the journey via the North Tyneside sorting centre for O’Briens (our waste contractor), to the plastic mill in Derby, and potentially afterwards (sale of plastic polymers as a commodity, to be used in manufacturing another product). Including why we recycle, why we ask staff to segregate plastic bottles and other plastic (different polymers), legal compliance etc. Possibly include plastic waste reduction tips (have a packed lunch using Tupperware instead of buying lunch in plastic containers etc) and plastic waste reuse tips (reuse of plastic bottles etc).

The Life Cycle of Paper; a journey through the recycling process of paper waste (UK travel involved).
Short educational film about the lifecycle of our paper waste, from the disposal of paper in the office, detailing the journey via the North Tyneside sorting centre for O’Briens (our waste contractor), to the paper mill in Kent, and potentially afterwards (sale of paper as a commodity, to be used in manufacturing another product). Including why we recycle, types of paper we can recycle (e.g. nothing laminated), contamination issues (staples etc), legal compliance etc. Possibly include paper waste reduction tips (do you really need to print that email?, print on both sides, etc) and paper waste reuse tips (use scrap paper for making notes etc).

The Life Cycle of a Computer; a journey through the recycling process of WEEE waste (UK travel involved).
Short educational film about the lifecycle of our electrical waste (WEEE – Waste electrical and electronic equipment). When the university has old computers, lights, fans etc, the ‘waste’ is collected by Second Byte, a charity in Doncaster who mend / take apart and reuse bots of, the ‘waste’ to create working appliances. The charity employees people who have been terminally unemployed, and they have a shop from which they sell the appliances to keep the charity going. The journey should include the decision to get rid of the (for example) laptop, via the forms filled in to arrange a collection, the collection, the charity, the shop and then in a new home. Also need to include legal issues (data protection etc), why we recycle our WEEE, legal compliance etc.

For more information on Newcastle University’s recycling, please visit www.ncl.ac.uk/recycle

Go Green Week is People & Planet’s annual national week of action on climate change in schools, colleges and universities. This year at Newcastle University, students will be holding a week of activities to raise awareness and launch their “Going Greener” projects.

Local company Green Scene have teamed up with Newcastle University’s People & Planet in order to provide environmentally themed, alternative nights out and first on the agenda is Carbon Speed Dating (just in time for Valentine’s Day!). This fun and relaxed evening is taking place on Monday 7th February at Kaffeccinos and it is a great opportunity to get out and meet new people. And who knows, as well as finding a few tips on how to reduce your carbon footprint, you may even find love!

So if you fancy a night out with a bit of a difference check out their facebook page here for more information on tickets.

To highlight unnecessary amount of waste in the food industry, People & Planet members will also be outside the Robinson Library handing out FREE SMOOTHIES on Tuesday 8th February made from fruit which would have otherwise been thrown out by local supermarkets and markets. So thirsty passer-by’s, keep a look out!

Continuing on with the food theme, you can catch a showing of Food Inc. on Wednesday 9th February at the Salsa Cafe, with the film kicking off at 8.30pm. Food Inc. is an Oscar nominated eye-opening documentary which examines America’s corporate controlled food industry – a must see for keen movie and food fans. More details about the event can be found on their facebook page here

To round up Go Green Week, People & Planet and other local Green Initiatives will be setting up some stalls outside the Robinson Library on Friday 9th February. So pop down and have a look if you fancy getting involved with future activities, there may even be some freebies handed out from us here at the Sustainability Team!

Lisa, Student Engagement Intern