Are students the future of energy efficiency?
Are students the future of energy efficiency? This was the question posed to BECC (Behaviour, Energy and Climate Change Conference) in Baltimore, USA this October by Richard Bull, SAVES' dashboard expert. BECC is the leading international behaviour, energy and climate change conference taking place each year in USA, attracting over 500 delegates from industry, local government, and academia who come from all over the world.
Whilst there have been many studies on the success of University energy saving competitions using energy dashboards, most focus on single case studies. The SAVES project was proud to have been invited to present its findings after a competitive selection process for abstracts. Clearly, the scale of the SAVES project, which has run in five countries and reached over 50,000 students over the last two years is of international importance.
This paper presented key findings on the effectiveness of Student Switch Off competition, as it has been implemented in Europe and reflections and recommendations are offered towards the role of dashboards and student led competitions. The session was really attended and lots of interest was expressed in the work of SAVES and the National Union of Students.
The SAVES project was also proud to have been invited to present at the EU Sustainable Energy Week conference, in Brussels, Belgium this June, where it was part of a panel that discussed successful approaches to engagement for sustainable energy. The EU Sustainable Energy Week conference is the most important European conference dedicated to sustainable energy policy issues.
In addition to the two big conferences, SAVES was proud to be part of UNICA Green's annual workshop taking place in Rome, Italy, that draws together experts from around Europe that focus on sustainable initiatives within universities. Finally, SAVES was successful in applying for the NAFSA (association of educators) conference in the USA this summer- we decided however to limit our carbon footprint and not attend the conference! Check out all the other conferences we have presented to in the past few years.
There is clearly a lot of interest in the education, adacemic and policy communities with regards to the signigicant impact that the SAVES project creates. Well done to all the students who have been so fantastic in taking part in the campaign - all your actions really do make a big (positive!) difference on our environment.
