Celebrating our teams at the Sustainable Essex Awards

Every year we celebrate the teams who have participated in Sustainable Essex. Sustainable Essex is a programme where departments work towards embedding sustainability in their departmental areas.

This year we had 30 teams participate, and we would like to thank every team for taking part and helping the University reduce its impact on the environment.

What have teams achieved in previous years?

All teams that take part are making a difference to reduce their environmental impact. Some examples are:

• In Soft FM they have been working with their cleaning materials supplier to reduce the amount of products they purchase to clean both the student residences and the academic areas on campus, they are committed to reducing not only their plastic waste in the use of bottles and containers but also the use of any unnecessary chemicals. They have adopted an environmentally friendly product range called Innuscience who are working to develop sustainable solutions to replace the use of harmful chemicals; at the same time, developing more effective ‘natural’ cleaning solutions.
• Essex Business School have created a sustainability policy which they are now working to embed.
• Workplace, Health and Wellbeing introduced PPE recycling onto Colchester Campus when the COVID testing centre was open on Square 5.
• Many departments encourage their staff to turn off lights and computers, keep windows closed when it is cold outside, using a reusable cup and reducing and recycling their waste where they can.

If your department has changed the way they work to reduce their environmental impact please get in touch with us at sustainability@essex.ac.uk, as we would love to hear about it.

How can you get involved?

As part of our Sustainability Sub Strategy we encourage all departments across the university to take part in Sustainable Essex. By 2023 we want 100% achievement of the Sustainable Essex programme by all departments / sections. To get involved please email us at sustainability@essex.ac.uk for more information.