Sustainability

In 2020, the College formed a Sustainability Working Group to generate and discuss policies that will lead the college to net zero carbon emissions. The group contains representatives from the whole college community including students, support staff, and senior management. The group is currently chaired by Timothy Walker, former Director of the University of Oxford’s Botanical Gardens and a Lecturer in Plant Sciences. The group was previously chaired by the freshwater and marine ecologist Associate Professor Michelle Jackson. In addition to driving our innovative travel policy, the Sustainability Working Group in 2022 also secured funding for the appointment of a Sustainability Officer within College to lead the implementation and advocacy of our Sustainability Plan. 

We continue to work in partnership with the University and the Conference of Colleges to reduce our carbon emissions. You can read the University Sustainability Working Group’s proposed strategy here. 

We fully divested from our holdings in fossil fuel companies in March 2021. Furthermore, the College reinvested the proceeds from selling its fossil fuel holdings in the purchase of The Renewables Infrastructure Group (TRIG), an investment company whose purpose is to generate sustainable returns from a diversified portfolio of renewables infrastructure contributing towards a zero-carbon future.

Smart Building Management systems have been installed across the site to monitor, manage and adjust boiler performance. Thermostatic radiator valves are being installed to heat more efficiently, and we are currently piloting the use of water ionisation technology in boiler feeds. Solar panels and ground source heat pumps are installed on two student accommodation buildings for low-carbon heating. Our latest accommodation block, which opened in 2019, utilised CLT in its construction rather than concrete to reduce energy use both during manufacturing and during its operation.

The new Ratan Tata Building will also be optimised for energy saving measures according to Passivhaus Principles. It will use air-source heat pumps to achieve a heating/energy demand target of 20 kWh/m2/yr.

Somerville currently procures all its energy from 100% renewable suppliers. All tungsten lights in the college are replaced when they expire with efficient LEDs, a process which is now well over halfway complete. Sensors are being installed in communal rooms to replace the light switches and save energy.

The Ratan Tata Building, due to open in 2027, represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to expand Somerville’s teaching and learning space, support research with global impact and articulate our College’s vision of a sustainable and forward-looking academic community.

The Ratan Tata Building will be a highly energy efficient building designed according to Passivhaus principles, and will contribute to achieving the carbon-reduction targets adopted by the Oxford Local Plan 2036. Features will include:

• Air-source heat pumps to provide low carbon heating and cooling (heating energy demand target 20 kWh/m2/yr
• Energy-efficient glazing and ventilation
• Passive Design Measures aimed at optimising the building envelope, maximising daylight and limiting overheating

The Somerville College Biodiversity Umbrella Project is a longitudinal study aimed at supporting and expanding biodiversity in the College gardens. Supported by all members of College, the Project repeats every 3-4 years with previous biodiversity audies in 2021 and 2025.

The findings of our Biodiversity Umbrella Project will be used to introduce a wider variety of species of plants to provide habitats and mitigate the effects of climate change, along with the provision of further wild spaces to accommodate different species. merville College runs regular biodiversity audits to biodiversity on the site.

Explore the Somerville Biodiversity Umbrella Project

Read the full report of the Biodiversity Audit (2022)

Our next biodiversity audit is scheduled for 2027.

The Menu

We have revised and improved our vegetarian and vegan menu, and serve ruminant meat only once a week in hall. Ingredients are sourced locally whenever possible, and fish is now purchased from Marine Stewardship Council-certified sustainable suppliers. Following kitchen refurbishments in 2020-21, our kitchens will use induction cookers to prepare food more energy efficiently and without the need for fossil fuels.

Changing Attitudes

terms of dining options, Somerville offers its vegan/vegetarian options as first or second items in the menu, to avoid the impression that meat should be the default, and actively communicates the carbon impact of animal-free diets. As of Michaelmas 2025, this has led to more students selecting non-meat options (~42%). 

Reducing Waste

Finally, with the support of both the JCR and MCR Committees, Somerville is moving away from offering disposable takeaway food containers because, while made of cardboard, these are invariably soiled and therefore non-recyclable. Students are actively encouraged to bring their own reusable food containers and otherwise pay a nominal fee for using the cardboard containers. 

One of the areas where academic communities have historically made a significant contribution to pollution is by flying to conferences and other academic engagements. Following a proposal conceived by one of our own students, Somerville College is the first educational establishment in the UK to authorise a new scheme that will incentivise our students and academic staff to choose lower carbon travel solutions such as rail over flying when college travel funding is available. Academics, staff and students at Somerville College in receipt of college funding for travel will now use a Gold Standard compliant offsetting scheme when flying, with the costs reimbursed, while students receiving discretionary travel awards can receive a higher sum for selecting low-carbon transport solutions.

Somerville is contributing to the fight against climate change by supporting climate change research. The Oxford India Centre for Sustainable Development is undertaking cutting-edge work on cooling technologies, reforestation and water justice that will empower its scholars to tackle the climate crisis in the global South. Somerville is also fortunate to have many Fellows and early-career academics working on globally relevant solutions to the climate crisis. These include Professor Michelle Jackson, whose work on individual-to-ecosystem responses to environmental change is providing insights on how warming and other stressors can cascade through food webs, and Professor Renier van der Hoorn, who was awarded a €2.5m grant by the European Research Council to continue his work on developing new crop protection strategies by unlocking extracellular immunity. They are joined by Professor Noa Zilberman, a Google Research Scholar 2021, whose research on computer infrastructure solutions has the potential to halve the energy consumption of data processing centres that are otherwise forecast to consume 20% of the world’s electricity by 2025.

We were the first college to implement food waste recycling. The kitchens recycle all food when safe to do so, and we have implemented a comprehensive waste management strategy. We are currently piloting food bins in student kitchens. We are currently developing further recycling strategies, including the donation of unused computer hardware to Dell for recycling/reuse in schools and a contract to offer terracycling bins for hard to recycle items.

The Conference of Colleges, the body which represents Oxford University’s colleges, has joined the Zero Carbon Oxford Partnership. The Partnership have pledged to help Oxford achieve net zero carbon by 2040 for scope 1 and 2 emissions, a goal we share. The partnership provides a forum for organisations based in and around the city to collaborate in accelerating emissions reduction, and we look forward to working with other colleges and organisations across the city to reduce emissions.

We are proud to host a new conference, OpenAg, looking at the development of sustainable agriculture in partnership with UPL. The conference has been postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, but we will make more details available in due course.