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We're seeing the need to reduce energy consumption
and to do that in an environmentally sustainable way.
Universities, as other parts of the public sector,
are under large pressures to reduce their environmental footprint.
Universities have to find ways of reducing their costs.
And lowering energy, which benefits the environment,
is a highly important one.
(narrator) The environment is at the forefront of everybody's minds -
including universities, who have high energy needs.
IT in universities and colleges in the UK has a large carbon footprint.
We estimate that one and a half million computers,
quarter of a million servers and printers,
put together, will be producing
around half a million tons of CO2 this year,
with associated energy costs of well over a hundred million.
ICT also has energy and environmental costs
associated with its manufacture and distribution
and also in its disposal at the end of life.
(narrator) One campus, Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh,
has set a new benchmark in sustainable design
by transforming an unused East Lothian site into a green campus.
I think universities have always led society,
and it's so important, given that we have so many young people here,
that we are leaders in every field that we can be.
And recently, obviously,
the environment is the thing that's been of most interest.
Features that we have used in the campus
are not the obvious ones that you might expect.
So we don't have windmills and we don't have solar panels.
But what we have done is embed the environment
in everything we've thought of and done in the design of the campus.
It's something to be proud of.
Being sustainable is what it's all about.
I think more and more people are conscious of that.
I think QM, from the minute you set foot on campus,
you're aware that we're doing a number of things
to try and promote sustainable living.
And hopefully the students can appreciate that
and continue living in a sustainable manner.
It's given me an insight into how we have a voice to effect change
and in what ways we can effect change,
and how small things can begin to make a very big difference.
(narrator) At the heart of QMU's transformation into a green campus
is their innovative use
of environmentally sensitive technology.
The IT sustainability issue around Queen Margaret
was all around fitting in
with the overall strategy for the campus itself.
It's about reducing energy consumption.
It's about reducing heat output
and therefore not having to put in air conditioning, in particular.
(man) Our ICT strategy is at the bedrock of delivery of this campus.
Simply put, without it we could not have achieved
the space reductions in terms of floor area that we did,
we could not have achieved the layout
and form of design that we have,
and we wouldn't have achieved the energy savings that we have.
(narrator) The strategy has focused on using
a lower-energy IT infrastructure known as thin-client technology.
Thin-client technology is effectively putting
a very low-power, low-specification device on the desk
and doing all the computing in the server room itself.
So all the terminal does on the desk
is it passes the keyboard, video and mouse signals
up to the servers in the server room where all the applications run.
If you have low power consumption on the desktop,
you can then reduce the heat output,
and that then allows us to avoid putting air conditioning
into our large areas, our large IT labs.
The benefits that the students really get from using thin-client
in that we're able to put a large number of devices out for them,
which is the first benefit.
They can also then log in at any terminal in any location
and get the same applications that they would do wherever they were,
and that also includes at home.
So we deliver a remote desktop service
that gives the students an identical setup as if they were actually sat
in front of a terminal within the campus.
It's good, because otherwise if you wanted to find information
you'd always have to come here.
And I live, well, half-hour out on the bus.
So I can do it from home. If I wake up in the middle of the night
and want to research something, I can do it there.
It's really good. That's what they need at universities now.
They've broken it down in such a way
that you learn it once and you'll take it with you,
and I've started to see the same technology being used
in a lot of other public spaces.
(narrator) So the technology has benefited students
and the environment.
But what about the university?
It very much helps universities
in a climate where finance is very difficult.
It helps them reduce their costs. It should.
A lot of sustainability is about
energy reduction and carbon reduction,
both of which bring cost savings to universities in operational terms.
We made approximately a million pounds savings,
in terms of plant and equipment, from the ICT strategy.
In operational terms, a conservative £50,000 a year
in terms of energy savings arriving from thin-client.
(narrator) The campus has attracted a lot of positive attention
and won a major award for green ICT sponsored by JISC
as part of its Getting Greener programme,
which is helping universities
reduce the environmental impact of their ICT.
JISC was keen to sponsor the new ICT, green ICT, category
in the Green Gowns this year
because we saw the value of awards like this
in raising the profile of this area,
which is a new area for many universities to grapple with.
The Green Gown Award was enormously important for us.
When we started the design of the building,
we wanted to hit the highest levels of green facilities that we could,
and winning this one for the green IT was a measure of that success
and it was one of the ones we had pinpointed
as being an excellent target and an excellent award to win.
It's great for us in terms of recognition
of all the hard work that's gone into this campus.
But I think it also marks us out as leaders in this particular field,
which is all to the good in terms of future marketing and profile,
and future education of others as well.
We've seen a lot of interest in the campus
since winning the Green Gown Award.
We've hosted a number of visits from a large number of institutions.
Well over 50 institutions have been up here
to find out what we've actually done and how we've achieved it.
(Scott) A lot of things other universities can learn
from what we did.
It doesn't have to cost you more money.
If you take a holistic approach to sustainability,
you can achieve it within your costs that you set out with,
but you can also then achieve savings in operational terms.
I think that's a key message.
(narrator) QMU is showing the way
for universities pioneering sustainable technologies,
and the future is looking green for UK higher education.
(Muir) In the future, all universities will have to be green.
We're seeing a lot of legislation coming into play
that will force universities and all public-sector bodies
to think about their green IT,
and also it actually makes good business sense as well.
In the future, all universities will have to be green.
It's important that universities lead in fields like this.
But because young people are so interested in the environment,
I think it's also important for universities' future markets
that they are actually delivering what their customers want.
(narrator) To find more about green ICT, including case studies
and a tool to measure your institution's carbon footprint,
go to www.jisc.ac.uk/greenict
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