TU/e’s Sustainability Office recently presented the university’s first comprehensive CO₂ Footprint. A painstaking job, I imagine. Especially since much of the data is not readily available and has to be obtained indirectly, such as through the so-called spend-based method, in which expenditures are multiplied by recognized conversion factors. 

The results, however, provide spectacular insights for further sustainability efforts at TU/e.

Under the Dutch Climate Act, the Netherlands must be climate neutral by 2050—and that includes TU/e. That may seem far off, but after 35 years of climate policy, Dutch emissions have fallen by “only” 42 percent. And the final stretch is always the hardest.

We now know how to make electricity more sustainable, especially at TU/e. But how do you bring down emissions from air travel?

The CO₂ Footprint shows that this is precisely where TU/e generates a significant amount of emissions: at 4,522 tons of CO₂e (= CO₂ or its equivalent in other greenhouse gases) in 2024, air travel is our third-largest source of emissions.

As long as sustainable aviation remains wishful thinking, TU/e will have to reduce these emissions through behavioral change. That means fewer business trips and giving staff more opportunities to travel longer distances by train.

A second important finding is that 95 percent of TU/e’s emissions fall under so-called scope 3 (57,210 tons of CO₂e). These are not emissions produced directly by TU/e—but they are emissions we cannot do without.

Consider, for example, emissions from commuting (708 tons from cars, 384 tons from public transportation), and from the goods and services we purchase, such as waste processing, ICT, and hardware and software. In modern terminology, these are emissions from “partners.”

Under the Dutch Climate Act, their emissions will also have to reach net zero by 2050. It is therefore important for TU/e to look beyond what happens on campus and actively hold partners accountable for both their ambitions and their actions to reduce emissions. If they take no concrete steps, we will need to do business with others.

But we can think even more broadly. The climate is, for example, an excellent additional reason to lobby for a direct intercity connection to Düsseldorf or Aachen.

Have ideas of your own? Today, Tuesday, February 24, the Sustainability Office is hosting a walk-in lunch about the Footprint and the methodology behind it.

Pieter Pauw is assistant professor in the Technology, Innovation and Society group. The views expressed in this column are his own.

This column was translated using AI-assisted tools and reviewed by an editor