Sustainability and Climate Change

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Sustainability at Essex

At Essex we’re leading by example. On 9 December 2020, the University joined many organisations across the world in declaring a climate and ecological emergency. Our advisory group, made up of colleagues from across the University seeks to respond to this declaration and relies upon our research community to lead the way in new thinking and understanding.

We are carrying out improvements across all three campuses, with recent work including:

• Improving roof insulation in our older buildings.
• Installing solar panels on buildings including student accommodation.
• Upgrading to energy-efficient LED lighting.
• Creating a re-use scheme for our office furniture, so items such as desks, chairs and filing cabinets can have a second life.
• Empowering staff and students to make sustainable choices. This includes providing vegetarian and vegan catering in outlets, providing water refill stations for those with reusable bottles, and providing recycling and food waste bins.