Decarbonising our campuses

We continue to invest in sustainable initiatives to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and provide energy security for our campuses.   

In recent years we have installed solar panels across nineteen building roofs, a car port and 1,800 panels on our land near Duryard Halls of Residence. In 2023/24 this included the roof of Pennsylvania Court, the Tennis Centre and Harrison. In 2025, we added further solar panels to Physics Building, Richard’s Building and Holland Hall. All of the installations are generating over 3,000 Mega Watt hours (MWh) of energy for our Streatham and St Luke’s Campuses.  

More solar panel installations are planned for the next three to five years to further reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and we are proposing to use wind power to provide clean energy to the Penryn Campus, supporting our target to be Carbon Net Zero and our ambition in Strategy 2030 to lead meaningful action against the climate emergency.   

In 2026, we will be installing solar panels on three new buildings across our Exeter campuses, including the Forum Library, Exeter Medical School (St Luke’s) and Peter Chalk. These installations are expected to generate an additional 260 MWh of clean energy per year, the equivalent to providing energy to over 98 domestic households, and save a total of 26 tonnes of CO2 per year. 

We switched the heating source in the Cornwall House building and swimming pool from gas to clean electricity air source heat pumps. The air source heat pumps at Cornwall House save over 160 tonnes of CO2 compared to heating the building and swimming pool with fossil fuels (that’s equivalent to heating 60 domestic households). Further heat networks and infrastructure options are being explored to deliver carbon savings that provide long term benefits for our estate.

Energy efficient lighting upgrades are taking place across our campuses. In recent years, six large buildings have been upgraded to LED lighting, including the Forum and the Forum Library, which resulted in an energy saving of 999,776 kWh of electricity per year and a utility bill saving of £369,959 annually. Replacing the outdated lighting with energy efficient LED solutions reduces our energy consumption, as well as reducing maintenance costs, improving comfort in buildings and enhancing biodiversity (i.e. for bat populations) on our campuses. We are upgrading a further 17 buildings internally and externally in the next few years.