Univali’s Biguaçu Campus: The first Campus in Brazil to generate 100% of its energy

Abstract

Univali is a communitarian higher education institution located in the south of Brazil. It has seven campuses spread along the coast of Santa Catarina. One of those campuses is located in the city of Biguaçu, and was the first university campus in Brazil to be 100% energy-autonomous. Since 2018, the Biguaçu campus operates with 596 solar panels which occupy an area of 1.000m2. Such structure produces 196MWh per year, and is responsible for the campus’s energy full autonomy. This institutional concern meets the values foreseen in Sustainable Development Goal number 7 from the United Nations 2030 Agenda, which aims to ensure access to clean sources of energy. The major part of Brazilian electricity production is obtained from hydroelectrical plants, and, regardless of the fact that it is considered a clean source of energy, the impacts for the plants’ implementation are usually large. In this sense, the use of solar panels is cleaner and less damaging to the environment. For that, it is believed that Univali’s experience in solar energy generation represents best practices in the energy indicator of UI GreenMetric. The article aims to demonstrate Univali’s experience in having the first campus in Brazil to be completely energy efficient. In order to achieve its goals, the article is written based on literature review and the analysis of institutional and governmental data.