UfU Information | Issue 5 – June 2022 | Department of Energy Efficiency & Energy Transition
A climate-neutral future
KlimaVisionen schools are ready for change!
Anyone who has ever visited a school will know that schools are the type of public buildings that consume a particularly large amount of resources. The often large and sometimes old buildings are expensive to heat and require a lot of electricity and water. They are also used by so many different groups (pupils, parents, clubs and sports groups, teaching staff, janitors, secretaries and other employees) that it is difficult to determine exactly who is responsible for resource consumption. This is why UfU has been working for over 25 years to reduce consumption in schools through education, with some immense savings. Since last summer, however, our work in schools in the field of energy efficiency and energy transition has developed significantly.
Climate neutrality is the future
Our new “Climate Visions” pilot project differs from our previous school projects in that it not only aims to reduce CO2 emissions by saving energy, but also includes other topics such as mobility, nutrition and procurement in order to put schools on the path to climate neutrality. In this way, we are taking the next big and important step in the field of EE, which must be taken in all new and existing schools in the future. In Berlin alone, there are 827 schools with 370,000 users, and 32,228 general education schools in Germany as a whole. This huge number of schools must become climate-neutral sooner rather than later if Germany wants to achieve the Paris climate targets. This is exactly what we want to achieve with “KlimaVisionen”.
Schools are complex
Schools are extremely complex systems. Analyzing the interests and user behavior of the many different groups in a school, coordinating them and ultimately reducing resource consumption is quite complicated and cannot be done without dedicated teaching staff and motivated students.
However, asking schools to become climate-neutral presents them with a huge task that cannot be accomplished without outside expertise and a general roadmap. As always, the agonizing question is: where do you even start? In order to achieve true climate neutrality, there must be intensive discussions about the way to school, the food and portion sizes in the canteen, paper consumption, building insulation, the heating system, intelligent lighting systems, suppliers and many other topics. These discussions require not only ingenuity and perseverance, but often also technical expertise on various energy consumption and broad knowledge of available solutions. This would simply be too much for the teaching staff and other employees, who have another job to do in addition to transforming the school.
The “KlimaVisionen” project
This is why UfU launched the “KlimaVisionen” pilot project. We have enough experience in working with schools throughout Germany to support the schools participating in the program with their roadmap to climate neutrality. In Berlin, over 30 schools are now taking part. The project consists of different phases for each school and has one goal: upon successful completion of the program, the participating school has a concrete roadmap for its path to climate neutrality. With this roadmap, the school can follow its path to climate neutrality based on concrete measures and developed solutions. The complex topic has become tangible and can now be implemented step by step.
The vision workshops
The special thing about the “KlimaVisionen” project is the vision workshops. We take the approach that climate neutrality can only be achieved if the roadmap has been jointly developed and ultimately agreed by all user groups of a school. This is why the project includes so-called vision workshops. On these days, pupils, school management, teaching staff, parents, janitors and UfU come together to take a close look at the school, analyze its problem areas and develop ideas and solutions.
Climate protection partner of the year 2022
Our “KlimaVisionen” project was recently recognized in the “Climate Protection Partner of the Year” competition run by the Berlin Chamber of Industry and Commerce. On May 4, we were awarded first place in the category “Recognition Award for Outstanding Projects of Public Institutions”.