Find out what the Sustainability team got up to in March

Last month we celebrated the university's Climate Action Week. We would like to thank everyone for taking part. This newsletter content has been written by Sam a 3rd year Multimedia and Journalism student who completed work experience with us at the end of March. He has written about the successes of Climate Action Week and a couple of blogs. We hope you enjoy it!

Essex Food promote use of reusable cup across campus

During the annual Climate Action Week which took place between the 13-17 March, Essex Food worked alongside the Sustainability team to try and educate students and staff about the amount of waste single-use cups can produce. According to statistics, around 8% of hot drinks sold on campus are sold in a reusable cup. Statistics from Plastic Education say that less than 1% of the single-use cups produced are recovered and recycled. The rest being sent to a landfill, incinerated, or left to pollute the environment.

So, to help combat this problem on campus, Essex Food and the Sustainability team have been promoting the use of reusable cups at its food outlets. If you bring a reusable cup to a food outlet and purchase a hot drink, you will save 25p, so if you buy a hot drink 5 times a week, you’ll be saving £5 a month. So, bring along your reusable cups to any outlet as they accept any reusable cup to use for a hot drink.

Don’t have one?
Well, Essex Food is also planning to release a new range of reusable cups in the summer, with a range of rainbow colours which represent each Essex Food café. You’ll not only be saving yourself money, but you will be helping the environment by not filling it up with harmful single use cups.

Climate Action Week at Southend and Loughton campus

Over on the Loughton and Southend campuses, there were plenty of events going on for Climate Action Week, in the hope to educate and inspire people to try and live more sustainably.

In Loughton, we were joined by the Funding team and we were set up in the SU cafe. They talked to students about how they can live sustainably while saving money, carbon footprints and also climate friendly actions that students could take when on campus.

In Southend, there was a Climate Action Fair where students had a chance to talk to the Careers team about sustainability in their careers and also speak to us about climate friendly actions while studying at the university and about sustainability on campus.

Southend-on-Sea city council also came to the campus to talk to students about climate action, projects and events which were taking place in Southend.
We were also joined by active transport group ForwardMotion. They encourage cycling around Southend and they showed students and staff how to repair a tyre puncture and also touched on the events they hold in Southend. They also put on a bike maintenance session where they offered students and staff a free bike check and security tagging.

Supporting Earth Day

To support Earth Day we are running our second Climate Literacy Training session available to all staff. We will be running the session on Wednesday 19 April 1-2pm on zoom. This is currently for staff only. It is a chance to learn about the climate emergency and carbon footprints. You will also find out about what the university is doing and what steps you can take as an individual. Each person who attends will receive a Climate Literacy training certificate. Spaces are limited. Sign up here.

Annual travel survey

A 5 minute travel survey is all we need and you could win £25, £50 or £75, there are 6 prizes up for grabs. Winners will be drawn at random after the survey closes on 7 May 2023. We would appreciate as many people completing the survey as possible.

Submitting Sustainable Essex Awards

The deadline for submitting your Sustainable Essex Award is Friday 28 April. Once you are happy with your submission please email the Box link to Sustainability@essex.ac.uk. If you have any questions, please let us know.