The People and Planet Green League 2011 was published yesterday in The Guardian and Salford have climbed a whopping 85 places from 122nd to 37th! We’re now classified at the top of the 2:1 category.The Green League is produced by the student-run organisation, People and Planet, annually and has been operating since 2007. The Green League score is calculated against the following criteria:
1) Environmental Policy
2) Environmental Staff
3) Environmental Management & Audit
4) Carbon Management Strategy
5) Ethical Procurement & Fairtrade
6) Ethical Investment
7) Sustainable Food
8) Student & Staff Engagement
9) Sustainability in the Curriculum
10) Renewable Energy Performance
11) Waste Recycling Performance
12) Carbon Reductions Performance
13) Water Consumption Performance
One of our strongest categories was environmental staff. Over the past year the University has developed a core team dedicated to addressing environmental sustainability of the University’s activities. Other strong categories include carbon emissions reduction and staff and student engagement. The University has demonstrated commitment with the launch of a Carbon Management Plan and ambitious targets to reduce emissions by 43% by 2020 from 2005/6 emission levels. Initiatives to achieve this include improving lighting across the campus, reducing the impacts from IT equipment and replacing old plant and equipment, many of which have already achieved results.
Other recent initiatives include;
o Awarded Fairtrade Status Jan 2011
o Achieved Bronze EcoCampus award this year and on track to gain the Silver award later this year
o Launch of Sustainable Food and Healthy Eating Policies and initiatives including a Love Food Hate Waste Student Masterchef competition
o Launch of staff Green Representative network
o Student Union maintained Bronze Award in NUS Green Impact Union Awards
As well as the core team a wide group of people have helped ensure our success; those in the Carbon Management Programme Board and Project Team, Fairtrade Action Group, Biodiversity Working Group and Green Representatives. Thanks for your involvement and support for the environmental sustainability programmes before and, particularly, during this year!
We are very pleased to have our commitment and work in this area recognised; however, we recognise that the challenge will be to maintain this going forward!
If you would like to look further at the Green League please see the link below.
Bec