Abstract
Campus greening is often the first step universities take towards sustainability. However, the diffusion of sustainability reporting methodologies and rankings is still at an early stage, and is biased in mainly measuring energy efficiency indicators while omitting basic features enabling meaningful comparisons among centers or addressing social (users) aspects related to long term sustainability transitions. This paper aims to introduce a critical perspective on sustainability university frameworks through: (i) a review of current Campus Sustainability Assessments (CSAs); (ii) performing and comparing the results obtained from the application of two internationally recognized CSAs (namely, Green Metric and ISCN) to two case studies (the Politecnico di Torino, in Italy, and the Hokkaido University, In Japan) and, finally, (iii) proposing a new CSA approach that encompasses clusters of homogeneous campus typologies for meaningful comparisons and university rankings. The proposed clusters regard universities’ morphological structures (campuses nested within city centers versus outside of a city compact ones), climatic zones and functions. At the micro scale, the paper introduces the need for indicators beyond measuring pure energy efficiency, but which are attentive to local and societal constraints and provide long-term tracking of outcomes. This, better than a sheer record of sustainability priority actions, can help in building homogenous university case studies to find similar and scalable success strategies and practices, and also in self-monitoring progress toward achieving truly sustainable university campuses.
Highlights
The key role of higher education institutions in the transition to a more sustainable society has been recognized and highlighted for almost three decades [1]
A sustainable university has been defined as a higher educational institution that addresses, involves and promotes, on a regional or a global level, the minimisation of negative environmental, economic, societal, and health effects generated in the use of their resources in order to fulfil its functions of teaching, research, outreach and partnership, and stewardship in ways to help society make the transition to sustainable lifestyles [5]
The reason why the Green Metric and the International Sustainable Campus Network (ISCN) have been selected is twofold: they are not country-related sustainability report tools. They are largely diffused, with more than 360 (Green Metric) and 70 (ISCN) participants from 20 countries. They stand as examples of the two main functions of Campus Sustainability Assessments (CSAs): the auditing of local initiatives (ISCN), and the reporting of sustainability indicators according to a fixed set of criteria (Green Metric)
Summary
The key role of higher education institutions in the transition to a more sustainable society has been recognized and highlighted for almost three decades [1]. To give an idea of magnitude beyond the European case, the educational sector in China accounts for 40% of the total energy consumption in public buildings [12], with 30 million students and 1.87 GJ/m2 of energy consumed in 2007 [13] In this way, universities are hubs for innovation and environmental education, but important actors within the urban setting, which must draw on a complex set of accounting indicators, dealing with environmental performances, but critically addressing economic, political, social and ethical issues [14]. In line with this special issue topic and objectives, the paper reviews some of the current CSAs, underlining their limits implementing effective improvements in the overall sustainability performance assessment method
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