Niels Schreuder (AGC Glass Europe), Sandrine Dixson-Declève (Director, CPSL Brussels), Princess Laurentien van Oranje, and Harry Verhaar (Philips Lighting) at the launch of The Atlas Project on low carbon schools on 11 November at Kariboe Primary School, Heemskerk, The Netherlands, on Dutch Sustainability Day
About The Atlas Project
Schools make up 17% of the EU27 non-residential floor space and emit a surprisingly large amount of carbon from the operation of their buildings. In the UK this represents about 20% of public sector emissions. School buildings in many parts of the EU are inefficient in their use of energy, wasting money which could be going into hiring teachers and purchasing better teaching materials.
A group of corporate leaders working with CPSL has come together to address a range of issues related to schools through CPSL’s collaboratory approach. This collaboratory has enabled the creation of a unique “living laboratory” concept: The Atlas Project.
Read the press release about the launch of The Atlas Project.
The Atlas Project Website
Please visit www.atlasschools.org for more information.
View the Online Toolkit
View the first development phase of the online toolkit in beta form.
This gives a flavour of the types of information schools will be able to generate by plugging in some simple data into the online calculator. Statistics about a school’s energy consumption and habits will enable it to plan cost and energy-saving changes, and will help to bench-mark its performance.
About the Toolkit
The Atlas Project has pioneered a tool to allow schools to identify their carbon exposure and deliver actions to reduce it. The toolkit addresses where GHG emissions can be reduced, and proposes cost-effective solutions across the entire system from transport to the built environment.
This toolkit has relevance for school management (Head Teachers, Bursars and Finance Directors) and provides an invaluable classroom resource. It goes beyond the measures typically recommended to schools (switching lights off, adjusting heating controls etc.) to cover more radical retrofit options such as targeted remodelling, fuel switching and renewable energy investment.
There are many real-time examples of how such services can be delivered to schools with transformational impacts, such as a retrofit calculator pointing to potential energy savings of up to 70%. The aim is to make the toolkit available as widely as possible, with some geographical clusters already having agreed to roll out the toolkit in their areas.
The toolkit concept is also taking centre stage at a number of events at COP17 in Durban, and it is hoped that it will be rolled out widely during 2012.
Outputs
The Atlas Project will demonstrate:
- the feasibility of a targeted GHG reduction in the built environment;
- the importance of looking at buildings such as school buildings as a system and managing carbon inputs and outputs;
- the significance of a multi-sectoral approach to decarbonisation from construction, lighting, materials, transport, food, insurance etc.;
- the success of a multi-business and public/private partnership approach to financing de-carbonisation projects;
- the potential scale-up impact;
- the importance of a holistic integrated approach to education, the benefits from creating a 'living laboratory', and improved student learning environments and general wellbeing;
- the link between de-carbonisation efforts and the next generation.
The members of The Atlas Project are all experienced in providing products and services in this field, and are well suited to addressing the challenges of climate and energy adaptation.
Members include: