Views

Steps towards achieving zero carbon in schools

It’s with some interest and perhaps a little bemusement to read about the governments ambition for new school buildings to be zero carbon from 2016 - 8 years away?

According to a section on the DCSF’s website,

The Department for Children, Schools and Families has set out its ambition for new school buildings to be zero carbon from 2016, and has appointed a Task Force to advise on how this might be achieved

Robin Nicholson, who chairs The Zero Carbon Task Force, said: “The Task Force has now identified the key issues to be addressed if we are to make progress towards zero carbon school buildings. We want to know the views of the major players in the school, construction, design and sustainability communities.”

More immediate task?

Whilst this is a worthwhile exercise for new schools (in 8+ years), surely the more immediate task in hand should be to look at existing schools and how they can make more and bigger steps towards lower energy usage, use of renewable energy and extensive recycling.

Start now!

Here’s 4 steps to getting started:

1. Work out how you are doing right now - complete a simple audit. How much energy are you using, where does it come from and how much recycling does your school do at the moment?

2. Have a brain storm session - get the children involved (they can be the most innovative sometimes)

3. Put together an action plan, based on your session.

4. Do it.

Here are 5 IT-related ideas to get you started:

1. Turn off computers, monitors, printers, etc when they are not in use. (Talk to your IT people about a schedule for when computers should be left on for updates)

2. Recycle printer and fax cartridges and get paid for it!

3. Only use recycled paper and have seperate bins to recycle it after use

4. Check the settings on your printer - change them to use less ink if you are printing ‘draft’ type documents.

5. Replace CRT’s with LCD screens. They use far less energy.

We’ll be writing more on this subject in the future.

Tags: energy saving, ideas