Lincoln University’s commitment to environmental sustainability continues to receive global recognition, with an improved placing in the 2019 UI GreenMetric World University Rankings.
The university is now ranked 148th out of 780 universities worldwide, up 70 places from last year.
Chief Operating Officer Phil O’Callaghan described the news as pleasing, but not surprising.
“We have a strong sustainability ethic at Lincoln and our improved ranking reflects the ongoing work we are carrying out to achieve our goal of being a leading sustainable organisation,” he said.
“We ranked especially highly in education (58th), due to the fact that sustainability plays a key role in many of our courses, research and publications, and we hold a large number of events and seminars relating to sustainability.
“We’re dedicated to increasing our score in energy and climate change through our Campus Development Programme, which includes an energy diversification project that will transition the campus towards renewable energy sources, including solar,” he said.
“This year, we have installed the largest solar array at any New Zealand university on the rooftop of our Te Kete Ika Dining Hall building and further projects of this nature will continue in 2020.
“We are also focusing on increasing our sustainability measures for transport, waste, water and green infrastructure through a dedicated taskforce.”
UI GreenMetric World University Rankings, established in 2010 by Universitas Indonesia (UI), were the first rankings to measure universities’ commitment to environmental sustainability.
They look at six indicators, including setting and infrastructure, energy and climate change, waste, water, transportation and education.
This year, 780 universities from 85 countries took part in the rankings.
