Environmental sustainability is at the forefront of everything we do at the ºÚ¹Ï³ÔÁÏÍø. It’s one of our key strategic drivers, and we remain firmly committed to our institution wide approach to embedding sustainability across all of our activities. This ranges from ensuring that sustainable development principles are rooted throughout our teaching and research, that our research develops lasting solutions and that we spread our impact effectively across all spheres from local to global. Our latest outlines the progress we have made.
This report highlights the following areas of significant progress:
- 1st place ranking in the People and Planet University league which demonstrates our institution-wide commitment and third year in the top 5 of this league.
- Top 30 in the world for our work in five of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (Times Higher Education Global Impact Rankings 2024).
- Joint 28th in THE Global Impact Rankings 2024.
- Zero direct or indirect investments in fossil fuels.
Key areas of progress
Together with a wide range of other topics, our Report details the steps we’ve taken across five key areas and how they contribute towards the .
Ethical Investment
Zero direct or indirect investments in fossil fuels
In 2020 we committed to divest from companies directly involved with the extraction of fossil fuels. In 2024 we have gone one step further and have amended our Investment Policy to exclude the largest fossil fuel extractions funders. We have now disposed of our holdings in Bank of America, Barclays and Wells Fargo. We will undertake a through review of our Investment Policy in 2025, with input from our student community.
Waste
62% of our waste is sent for recycling, composting, reuseor repair
The ºÚ¹Ï³ÔÁÏÍø is ranked 3rd worldwide for responsible consumption and production (THE Global Impact Rankings 2024).
Our Waste and Resource Use Strategy focuses on responsible resource use and sustainable waste management – wherever possible, we seek to reduce, re-use, recycle, and recover.
Our efforts are paying off: this academic year, 99% of the University’s operational waste was diverted from landfill, and we achieved a 62% recycling rate.
Biodiversity
Winner of 14 consecutive Green Flag Awards
Whiteknights, our main campus, features 120 hectares of woodland, biodiverse grassland, and a lake – and is home to more than 2,000 species of plant and animal life.
Enhancing and conserving the rich biodiversity of our green spaces is critical. To this end, we:
- Completed a comprehensive baseline ecological assessment of our Whiteknights campus. This will inform a new Biodiversity Action Plan.
- We collaborated with local schools to create a number of outdoor learning spaces on the University owned Langley mead nature reserve.
