.....................................................................................................................GREEN NEWS
Campus Living Labs initiative aims for a transformation THE Irish Universities Association has launched Campus Living Labs, in partnership with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), a project aimed at reducing waste and increasing recycling on IUA University campuses. This two-year initiative, will design and deliver behavioural and infrastructural interventions targeting consumption as well as the waste management habits of campus populations. Funded by the National Waste P r e v e n t i o n Programme (NWPP), a Government of Ireland initiative, the project aims to prevent waste, improve waste segregation and increase recycling across university campuses. Unique ecosystems With over 162,000 students across eight campuses, Irish Universities are unique ecosystems with populations like that of a small town or village, making them ideal testbeds or living labs for trialling waste and recycling interventions. With a focus on reducing food waste and eliminating certain single use plastics, the project will recommend and introduce best practice on waste and recycling to improve the overall sustainability of Irish campuses, moving Universities towards a circular economy. The waste and recycling interventions introduced under Campus Living Labs will also assist the higher education sector in meeting wider national targets, especially under Ireland’s Climate Action Plan and the Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy.
Multiple aims The Campus Living Labs initiative is particularly aligned with several aims set out in the Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy, including education to improve waste segregation, halving our food waste by 2030, improving recycling infrastructure, and banning certain single-use plastics in line with the Single Use Plastics Directive.
E-waste reaches record levels THIS year’s worldwide mountain of waste electronic and electrical equipment (WEEE) will total an estimated 57.4 million tonnes – greater than the weight of the Great Wall of China, Earth’s heaviest artificial object, according to the WEEE Forum. Last year’s Global E-waste Monitor 2020 reported that an estimated 53.6 million metric tonnes (Mt) of WEEE was generated in 2019. That represented a 21% jump in the five years since 2014 (with e-waste on a predicted course to 74 Mt by 2030). Global e-waste generation is therefore growing annually by 2 Mt, or about 3 to 4%, a problem attributed to higher consumption rates of electronics (increasing 3% annually), shorter product lifecycles and limited repair options. According to estimates in Europe, where the problem is best studied, 11 of 72 electronic items in an average household are no longer in use or are broken. Annually per citizen, another 4 to 5 kg of unused electrical and electronic products are hoarded in Europe prior to being discarded. When it comes to mobile phones, a French study estimates that 54 to 113 million mobile phones alone, weighing 10 to 20 tonnes, are sleeping in drawers and other storage spaces in French homes.
Irish seas now in Marine Protected Area
The project will: • Directly address & support the sustainable campus ambitions of Ireland’s universities. • Link to the Sustainable Development Goals for Ireland, particularly Goal 12 Responsible Consumption and Production and Goal 11 Sustainable Cities and Communities. • Assist campuses deliver on current and future legislative requirements regarding waste management, including the following: • reducing the generation of waste, in particular waste that is not suitable for preparing for reuse or recycling. • increasing the segregation & recycling of waste (particularly food waste). • addressing UN Sustainable Development Goal 12.3 to reduce by 50% per capita global food waste at the retail and consumer levels.
THE Government has joined 14 other countries and the EU in making a legally binding decision to establish the North Atlantic Current and Evlanov Sea basin Marine Protected Area (NACES MPA). The MPA covers 595,196 km² (over eight times the size of Ireland’s land area) and comprises a vitally important area for seabirds in the North Atlantic. The designation of the new MPA takes place amidst a worrying decline in seabird numbers. Located in the High Seas, the designated area is home to up to five million seabirds across 22 different species, including five – such as the Atlantic Puffin – that are globally threatened. Other threatened species, like the wide-ranging Basking Shark and Leatherback Turtle, also use this area.
Ros a Mhíl could be hub for floating turbines A report for Údarás na Gaeltachta has proposed that Ros a Mhíl habour be a centre for the development of the floating wind turbine industry off the west coast of Ireland, with the possibility of 900 jobs in the Galway Gealtacht. Offshore Renewable Energy Development Plan (OREDP) outlines the possibility of 27 GW of floating wind in Irish waters (7GW on the West Coast region closest to Ros a Mhíl). Ros a Mhíl has a natural 12 metre deep access but would also require extensive investment.
Education 47
