NEW ZEALAND: First carbon-neutral architecture faculty

On a cold winter day, the head of the world's first carbon neutral faculty of architecture and design is proving his commitment to energy conservation. An Antarctic blast has brought temperatures outside Victoria University of Wellington down to seven degrees centrigrade and there is snow on the mountains near the city - but Professor Gordon Holden has his window open and his heater off.

Just last month, Holden's faculty announced it had become carbon neutral thanks to a variety of measures, including the gifting of carbon credits from its energy supplier, Meridian Energy. In addition, it announced a plan to reduce its 340-tonne carbon footprint by 25% within four years.

Holden says to his knowledge the faculty is the first of its type anywhere in the world to become carbon neutral - a claim he plans to put to the test at next month's International Union of Architects conference in Turin. If there is another such faculty out there, he expects to be told.

At the conference, Holden will present his faculty's efforts to not only become carbon neutral but to reduce emissions. Those efforts included an independent audit of the faculty's emissions inventory, a reduction plan and carbon credit transactions, followed by certification of the faculty's carbon neutrality by government research institute, Landcare Research.

The biggest challenge now is likely to be the culture change needed to achieve emission reductions: "It comes down to individual actions," Holden says, explaining that his faculty has some 1,200-1,300 people, including academics, administrators, technicians and students, and they all need to contribute to emission reduction.

"We are all individually and collectively responsible," he says. As an example, Holden notes a recent project that saw some students cast concrete models of building reinforcing. "We shouldn't still be doing that because we are just generating waste that goes to the land fill. So we should change that assignment."

Waste and air travel are areas targeted for reduction, as is heating. "The building is heated by gas so we explored the possibility of turning the temperature down a degree or so."

Unusually, switching off the lights is not part of the faculty's emission reduction plan - as with the rest of Victoria University, the faculty buys its electricity from carbon neutral electricity supplier Meridian Energy, nearly halving its carbon footprint as a result.

In fact, Meridian was critical in the faculty's achievement of carbon neutrality - it gifted the carbon credits needed to offset its 340-tonne carbon footprint. In exchange, the faculty will give Meridian staff access to its library and put research projects of interest to Meridian before its students.

To date, the faculty is making good progress on its plan for emission reductions. So much so, that Holden expects it will achieve the target of a 25% reduction within 18 months.

* John Gerritsen is editor of NZ Education Review
john.gerritsen@uw-news.com