Background
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Environmental Damage on Par with Commercial Concerns |
2.36 million people (1.84 million students and 520,000 staff) learn, lecture, research and work at 334 different universities, colleges and polytechnics in Germany (Federal Statistics Office 1998, pp. 9;13). With regard to their consumption of energy and materials, universities are therefore comparable to large commercial concerns. Environmental pollution not only occurs in lecture halls and research laboratories, but also in the area of administration. This pollution could be reduced considerably by the systematic implementation of organisational and technical measures. For example, a third of all energy consumed in public institutions could be saved with the introduction of such measures (Public utility Hannover 1996 and Enquete 1990, p. 472). If the University of Osnabrück were to reduce its energy consumption by just 20% it could save 500,000 DM in energy costs every year.
However, the necessity to become more involved in environmental protection should not be guided by financial arguments alone: universities
make a significant contribution to the development of our society, and therefore have a special societal responsibility, in particular with regard to
the sustainable protection of the environment and the use of resources. University environmental protection projects can encourage other public
institutions to act, thus making the universities role models.
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Lack of Control Instruments |
On the commercial level, environmental aspects have already been taken into consideration in several concepts for ecological-oriented business planning (Birke et al. 1997, Federal Environment Ministry and Federal Environmental agency 1995, Winter 1993). The control instruments required to influence the ecological consumption of resources generally do not exist for the higher education sector. On the contrary, impediments to the implementation of environmental protection concepts abound.
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Resource-Saving Comprehensive Concept Required |
Despite these impediments, many German university administrations have managed to take measures to improve the environmental friendliness
of their respective institutions (cf. Starnick und Winzer's overview of 1994). More and more students, academic assistants and professors are
becoming aware of the situation, and contribute to the work in the form of study groups, projects and research (Viebahn 1998). However, there
is a complete lack of a resource-saving comprehensive concept containing an agreed package of measures encompassing all areas related to
the higher education sector, and which attempts to overcome the above-mentioned impediments. Conventional "administrative action" no
longer suffices - professional environmental management is now required in the higher education sector. Using the example of University of
Osnabrück, a model unique in Germany was elaborated containing the basis for such an environmental management concept. |
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Idea of the Project |
The project "Materials and energy flow analysis of a university - development of an environmental management system for universities using the example of the University of Osnabrück" was elaborated in cooperation with the Institute of Environmental Systems Research, the Environmental Protection Working Group of the university and the university administration. The project was sponsored by the Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt (German Federal Environmental Foundation) from November 1995 to April 1998, and thereafter was financed by university funds. Besides the unversity, there were contacts to HIS (Hochschul-Informations-Systeme) GmbH (University-Information-Systems), Hanover, to Ifeu-Institut (Institute for Energy and Environmental Research), Heidelberg, and to ifu-Institut (Institute for Environmental Computer Science), Hamburg. With its 12,500 students and 1,250 members of staff, the University of Osnabrück already fulfils a certain forerunner role as an environmentally friendly university. It boasts the lowest consumption of electricity for universities in Lower Saxony, with regard to usable floor space. The aim of the material and energy flow analysis was to show where the problems of pollution lie so that specific environmental protection measures can be taken. Besides technical improvements, measures in the non-investment areas in particular were to be elaborated, since the environmentally friendly behaviour of university members alone could achieve great savings. For this reason the following key areas were targeted for the planned environmental management system (EMS) at the University of Osnabrück:
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Outcome |
The result of the project is the Osnabrück Environmental Management Model for Universities.
It represents a »schedule« to built up an EMS at the university and is the
first comprehensive concept in the higher education sector. Though being
developed for the University of Osnabrück, it was
ensured that it could be applied to other institutions of higher education.
For simplicity it was divided into ten "building blocks" which can be carried
out step by step. In most cases it suffices to adapt the building blocks
to the structures of the university in question.
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Implementation at the University of Osnabrück |
The University of Osnabrück has commenced to implement an environmental management system according to this model. This includes the continuiation resp. the updating of building blocks that have already been started during the development of the model as well as the realisation of further elements. The responsible person for the implementation is the coordinator environmental management. |
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(Nearly) all |
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Peter Viebahn - last change: October 2000