For a sustainable development

The world is facing major challenges with rapid climate change, global environmental pollution, and shrinking biodiversity. The outlook is bleak if no action is taken. But, at DTU, we are optimistic. We believe that the development can be reversed if we all assume responsibility.

DTU takes sustainability seriously. This has long been an integral part of our work because it feels completely natural. In recent years, we have become even more conscious of our own efforts and impact in the field of sustainability, and, this year, for the first time, we are publishing a report outlining our ambitions and setting goals and objectives.

We educate responsibly

Sustainability is an integral part of how DTU educates engineers. We have incorporated sustainability in the curricula and competence profiles for all our study programmes. And we have introduced a charter for engineers that all our students are encouraged to adopt.

The charter encourages our students to work with sustainability from an environmental, economic, and social perspective and to collaborate across disciplines on developing solutions to the challenges the world is facing.

We conduct research into green solutions

We are committed to a sustainable future through the development of value-creating technology for people. As one of many initiatives, we have established an interdisciplinary centre for research and development in systemic and quantitative sustainability. The mission of DTU Centre for Absolute Sustainability is to provide factual advisory services about technologies that support real sustainable change.

We act sustainably

We create an inclusive and sustainable culture of trust and respect. We want to promote a sense of community and a good environment—both in how we interact with each other and in our physical surroundings. DTU’s campuses are used as living labs for the development of sustainable solutions in new construction, energy supply, operations, and waste sorting.

The world is changing—and so is our approach to sustainability. It is a constantly developing management task, where dialogue is key to our joint efforts. It is about how we lead at DTU. But it is also about how we act as a university and how we balance freedom of research with ethical, secure, and responsible international collaborations. Because in a changing world— more than ever—we need to make a positive difference and create technology for people. That’s what we do at DTU.

Anders O. Bjarklev, President