Sam, of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and a member of the UK Committee on Climate Change, isn't the homesick type but will sometimes put on a yodelling tape and think of Switzerland.

The CRC Efficiency Scheme is a mandatory carbon tax scheme that applies to large non energy-intensive organisations, such as LSE. This was announced in the Energy White Paper 2007 and came into force in April 2010. The purpose of this scheme is to create behaviour and infrastructure change to improve energy efficiency.

Under the scheme, every year, participants have to report on their UK-based CO2 emissions from all energy sources, other than transport fuel and domestic use, and purchase “allowances” for each tonne of CO2 that is emitted. The reports submitted are then used by the Environment Agency to compile league tables.

LSE registered as a participant to the CRC scheme in 2009. The first CRC reports were submitted in September. The school CRC footprint is 15,642tCO2. In the league tables, the School ranks in the top 30 of the universities.

No “allowances” had to be purchased for this first compliance year but the school carbon emissions would have cost about £180,000.

LSE's Carbon Management Plan must be revisited following the Government’s shock announcement on 31 October that subsidies for solar electricity production will be reduced by around 50 per cent.

Reduced subsidies for domestic solar electricity production have been proposed as part of an urgent effort to keep the Feed in Tariffs scheme budget under control and reflect the plummeting costs of the technology. The proposals, subject to consultation, would introduce a new tariff for schemes up to 4kW in size of 21p/kWh – down from the current 43.3p/kWh. Reduced rates are also proposed for schemes between 4kW and 250kW, to ensure those schemes receive a consistent rate of return.

LSE Rethink - which helps us move towards being a zero waste institution - has been granted a Bronze International Green Award (IGA) and has been named a finalist in the Green Gown Awards. 

LSE Rethink tackles all areas of waste generation under the umbrella project to create a zero-waste university. This includes the reduction of purchases, facilitated by re-use items such as furniture and stationery, and deploying Communal Recycling Stations to improve recycling uptake.

The International Green Awards are the leading global industry awards to showcase best practice examples of sustainability. Accredited by the RSA, the awards place an emphasis on responsible business practice and aim to showcase innovative and inspiring approaches to sustainability challenges. The School was the only university shortlisted alongside four international corporates in the Best Green 4R’s Award (Reduction, Reuse, Recycling, Recovery) category and was the only university shortlisted in the category. For more, see http://www.greenawards.com/winners 

LSE’s Rethink was also shortlisted in the 2011 Green Gown Awards, which recognise UK universities and colleges for outstanding achievements in sustainability. The School was one of eight universities shortlisted in the ‘Promoting Positive Behaviour’ category. LSE has won two Green Gown Awards in previous years: for LSE 100 in the Curriculum category (2010) and the NAB in the Sustainable Buildings category (2009).

Dr Victoria Hands, environmental and sustainability manager at LSE, said: “It is great that LSE’s Rethink strategy has been shortlisted for both these awards. Our vision for the future is a zero-waste university campus and the only way we can effectively do this is to promote positive behaviour change. Rethink asks us to reduce, reuse and recycle waste into resources. If we ‘Rethink’, we pause and consider the impact of our actions and decisions on the environment and communities around us.”

Now in its third year at LSE, Green Impact 2011-12 is currently being launched across the school with the support of Director Judith Rees, who wants every department to sign up to take the simple environmental and money-saving actions.

Last year 31 departments took part, involving 962 staff, of whom 140 were directly involved in a Green Impact committee. Twelve teams received Bronze Awards, 12 received Silver and 4 achieved Gold standard. An impressive 1,668 greening actions were completed – part of the nationwide Green Impact total of 19,620 greening actions.

This year, already 29 teams are signed up, including six academic departments, three research centres and five new teams. If your department has yet to sign up, why not call Louise Laker, the greener living assistant, to see what it involves?

Teams work through a series of tailored criteria to gain Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum or Diamond Awards, which are presented at a Celebration of Sustainability at the end of summer term. Criteria include actions to reduce energy use, and waste – together responsible for the majority of LSE’s carbon emissions. Visit www.greenimpact.org.uk/lse to sign up and register your team now.

LSE is implementing an Environmental Management System (EMS) to help deliver the Environmental Policy in everyday life. This includes a set of Environmental Action Plans, to tackle each area of our environmental impact - including energy, waste and transport - and set targets for improvement.

LSE was awarded EcoCampus Gold standard back in July, which certifies that the School has systems in place to manage all of its environmental impacts - from its carbon emissions to how the School would deal with an emergency oil spillage on campus.

The School is now aiming for EcoCampus Platinum in mid-2012. This will require us to monitor our impacts (eg. record the tonnage of waste disposed of per year) and review our own performance by carrying out internal environmental audits and reporting on them to senior management.

Furniture reuse from campus and moves has increased 250 per cent in the last three years (from 2008-09 to 2010-11) and has diverted 23 tonnes from landfill equivalent, and saved 100 tonnes of CO2e and £88k in purchasing and waste disposal costs.

In a survey conducted with staff using LSE Stock, the School's reuse scheme, 82 per cent considered it a valuable service and 93 per cent said they were likely to participate again to reduce costs, delivery times and make a more sustainable choice.

Lois Clifton (pictured), the Students' Union environment and ethics officer, updates us on recent activities at the SU. "A lot has been going on at the School since the start of this academic year. We are in the process of making the roof garden, which is on the fifth floor of the East Building, into a winter herb garden. We wanted to make the garden more useful for students. It's difficult for students to go up and pull up veg so we thought that if we had herb bushes they could take snippets over winter! Some of the planned herbs are bay, rosemary, sage etc.  

LSE's Communal Recycling Stations have been in operation across campus since July. We believe this to be the most comprehensive recycling system in the UK.

• only sweet wrappers, crisp packets and polystyrene are sent to waste-to-energy;

• mixed recycling includes all plastic, glass, cans, tins, paper and card;

• food compost across campus includes all food and tissues.

Initial feedback survey results indicate that 73 per cent are satisfied/very satisfied with the design and aesthetics of the bins, and 78 per cent are satisfied/very satisfied with their signage and bin labelling; 86 per cent understand the waste streams and an average of 73 per cent are satisfied/very satisfied to be segregating waste.

This month saw a truly collaborative effort to get the external Communal Recycling Stations out across campus. We still need to verify this statement but the Sustainability Team think that LSE is the first university in the UK (perhaps the world) to offer external food composting bins across its campus.

The Sustainable Futures Society is inviting staff and students to apply for grants of up to £12,000 to carry out projects which increase environmental and social sustainability, both on campus and farther afield. This is the second year that grants are being awarded from the fund; last year's winners are in the process of building an insulating green roof and bringing urban beekeeping to the LSE campus.

This year, the application criteria have been changed to allow projects to be implemented outside the School in local communities and to grant funding for research projects that will ultimately increase sustainability.

Application forms and further details can be found online at www.sustainablefutureslse.com. Sustainable Futures will also be hosting an information session on Tuesday 10 January at 5pm in CLM 2.04.

London councils have recently introduced on-the-spot fines for litter-louts. Westminster Council alone sweeps 12 million cigarettes off the borough’s streets every year and, depending on the borough you’re in, fines range from £50 to £80, and apply in all public spacess, wherever you are. Failure to pay can lead to prosecution, and a fine of up to £2,500.

The London Universities Environment Group (LUEG) is a network, reinvigorated and now co-chaired by LSE, that strives to improve sustainability on campuses across London.

Monthly workshops, usually hosted at LSE, address topics ranging from ICT energy efficiency to green roofs and biodiversity. Workshops this year have so far included:

• Sustainable procurement: presentations from Defra and the Sustainable Procurement Centre of Excellence were attended by almost 40 people, including senior procurement staff from several institutions.

• London Plan sustainability targets: the GLA explained the role of universities in achieving the Mayor's sustainability strategy

• 'LIFE' (Learning in Future Environments): a new nationwide programme to benchmark universities' sustainability

• Education for Sustainable Development: December's workshop will visit the Kingston University Sustainability Hub, which has successfully brought together their Estates Team with academic departments.

Catering staff have donated fruit tubs that have been adapted by Estates into special recycling points which are ideal for people needing storage boxes. Students and staff are welcome to pick up one free from the Fourth Floor Restaurant.

In this new column we catch up with alumni involved in sustainable activities and find out how their time at LSE shaped their interest in sustainability. 

Harriet Jackson, Government and Economics BSc, was part of Sustainable Futures while at the School and now works leading oikos International from Switzerland

What were you studying while at LSE and what sustainable activities were you involved with while at the School?

I studied for a Government and Economics BSc, taking European and Environmental Economics modules wherever I could. While I was at LSE, I was part of the student society oikos London, a chapter of the international student organisation for sustainable economics and management. We focused on how business and economics could contribute to sustainability, rather than how they couldn't. Our projects included workshops on how to communicate climate change effectively, oil companies talking about their view of sustainable development, and simulation games on collective action, such as www.perspectivity.org. I was also part of Sustainable Futures, the LSE student sustainability consulting group, and just the other day I met the oikos London Alumnus who founded it around six years ago.

How has this interest in sustainability carried on since leaving LSE?
Because of the inspiring people I met and the topics we covered as oikos London, I decided that I wanted to continue promoting sustainability in economics further, so I went on to become the head of the international side of oikos, in Switzerland. Now that my term with oikos is over, I am going on to work at a sustainability strategy consultancy in Lausanne, and one day I would love to set up my own social business.

Did your time at LSE shape or support your work in sustainable development?
My time at LSE definitely shaped my work in sustainable development. When I arrived, I was surprised by how many students had no understanding at all of how their future careers would impact other people in society- and how little desire there was to find out. The energy and intelligence at LSE is phenomenal - we should use it to figure out how to tackle the massive global problems of depleting natural resources, increasing inequality, loss of biodiversity, poverty etc rather than purely making money. I started studying just at the beginning of the crisis, in October 2007, so people weren't questioning the status quo much, but even now I feel like some of the brightest minds don't appreciate what the world is heading for if we don't get our act together.