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It’s an exciting time for the Sustainability team at King’s. Kat Thorne’s appointment as Head of Sustainability in the latter half of 2013 was a major boost to the university’s efforts at becoming a sustainable institution, given what she accomplished in the same role at the University of Greenwich. Over the past several months she has set about assembling a dream team of sustainable champions to help move King’s forward. As a result, the team now boasts managers of energy (Tom Yearley), waste and resources (Sunny Pawar) and sustainable labs (Martin Farley) along with three project assistants (Olivia, Sarah and Justin) – and the team is still expanding (so fast that this recent picture is already out of date)! Over the coming weeks and months this space will offer introductions to the new managers and what their work entails, providing a clearer picture of what sustainability means for King’s and the world of higher education.
There are many exciting projects and events in the works, and this space will serve to keep readers up to date on all things sustainable at King’s with new posts each week. The next major initiative, in which we want you to take part, is the NUS Blackout on Friday, 14 November. You can read more about it here. Also of particular note this week: renowned American environmentalist Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org, will be speaking in a free, public event at LSE on Tuesday, 4 November (find link to details below).
We also want you to get involved with this blog! Every week, aside from the above-mentioned updates, we will be posting a contribution from a member of the King’s community – students, staff and alumni – on a sustainability topic that they are passionate about. Are you interested in contributing? Get in touch for more details – we’d love to hear from you, no matter your background or your interest.
So be sure to check back regularly to keep informed about sustainability at King’s. We’re really excited for what’s in store!
Upcoming events
- Tuesday, 4 November, 18.30: Bill McKibben speaking at LSE
- Friday, 14 November, 18.30: NUS Blackout
Some news and stories
- Africa leading the way in restoring degraded land: Green restoration in Ethiopia
- A different way to look at the fracking question: Is fracking a human rights issue?
- IPCC confirms that humans are still causing climate change: Six key graphs
Hello there!
I’m Justin and I have recently joined the Sustainability team as a new Sustainability Projects Assistant. I couldn’t be more excited about joining the team and the great work being done.
I have recently completed a Master’s course in the history of science, technology and medicine here at King’s. One of the first modules I took as part of the course was environmental history, and over the past year I have become increasingly fascinated with the role of the humanities in addressing environmental concerns as well as interested in sustainability more broadly, which has led me to this position. I believe that universities have a special responsibility to be leaders in this area, and this is an exciting time for King’s in this domain. I am particularly interested in the role of individuals and in the creation of cultures of sustainability.
One thing I will be working on is turning this blog into a platform for sustainable engagement. It is a valuable medium for the team to keep the university updated on its events, but we also want it to be a medium for staff and students to contribute to the discussion and share their ideas and passions. Would you like to contribute? If so, please do get in touch. Keep your eyes on this space for more regular posts about all things sustainable.
Outside of this role, I am an avid reader and enthusiast of ultimate frisbee and ice hockey, among other things. I’m a Canadian who is very much enjoying exploring the UK and learning about our subtle cultural differences, often by unwittingly embarrassing myself.
If you’ve got questions about what we’re working on or how you can be involved, please do be in touch!
Blackout Friday 14 November – please join us!
King’s and KCLSU will be participating in the first UK-wide National Union of Students Blackout on Friday 14 November 2014.
As a university, King’s spends nearly £10 million on utilities per year. Small changes made by staff and students have the potential to dramatically reduce this figure, as well as reducing our carbon footprint and saving energy. For the Blackout, buildings on the Strand, Waterloo and Denmark Hill Campus will be included in the shutdown (not including labs).
Volunteer
Staff and students can work across the campuses during the Blackout evening. The evening will run from 18.30 until 21.45, and then we will have a small celebration with food and drinks. To volunteer, please fill out our sign up form.
Opt-out form
If you are in a blackout area and have essential equipment that should not be shut off, you need to advise us by completing an opt-out form by Friday 7 November.
If you require any more information please contact us on sarah.hayes@kcl.ac.uk or Olivia.1.james@kcl.ac.uk
Last Wednesday saw Guy’s campus host the first cycling event of the year. New and seasoned cyclists had the opportunity to have a free check up with, local cycling shop On Your Bike‘s Dr Bike, checking bikes are road worthy, and registration with Southwark Police.
If you missed the chance this time, Dr Bike will be back on Wednesday 19 November 2014 at Guy’s for free check up’s and registration. There will also be the chance to exchange places with a HGV, to see the blind spots.
The King’s Sustainability team are relaunching the Bicycle Users Group to create a platform where cyclists around the College can discuss anything to do with cycling. You can sign-up here if you would like join the group.
King’s students were given great ideas about social enterprises and how to start their own businesses last Thursday at the first Sustainability Forum.
The Sustainability Forum, which was held in Pyramid Room of Strand Campus, hosted two talks from Ento and Elephant Branded, a pair of university start-ups that are now innovative businesses based in London.
After a lively introduction about the Fossil Free campaign by Mark Horowitz, Sarah and Olivia opened the forum by explaining who the Sustainability Team are and what they hope the forum will achieve.
Ento (Japanese for insect) were the first to speak and argued that as the world’s population grows and countries become richer, other sources of food will be needed. Insects like grasshoppers and caterpillars could be the solution, as they are a more efficient food source than meat such as beef.
Ento is aiming to make eating insects more appealing to mass audiences by finding new ways to present them as food. They hope to slowly change the culture around insect food and introduce them into our everyday diet. Ento has partnerships with a farm in Spain who breed insects for human consumption, and organised a successful pop-up restaurant in 2013. They also sell products at speciality events and are planning to create a commercial product using crowdfunding.
The next speaker was Tim from Elephant Branded. Elephant Branded was started at university in 2011 and sells accessories hand-made by Cambodian communities using recycled cement bags. For every item Elephant Branded sells, a school bag or stationary kit is given to a needy child in Africa or Asia to help with their studies. In the past year Elephant Branded has snowballed, becoming more recognisable and selling in shops such as John Lewis. All of their profits currently go straight back into the business in order for them to expand the brand, with the founders not yet taking a salary.
Tim gave lots of advice to the students attending the forum, emphasising how important it was for universities students to take risks, especially on business ideas. Tim also stressed the point that Elephant Branded was not a charity, but a business, stating that “The more you make, the more you give away.” This highlighted the importance of financial sustainability: a social enterprise won’t last long without good foundations.
King’s students had lots of tough questions for the two companies, asking Ento about the appeal of their product, and Elephant Branded whether social products could ever challenge big brands. This helped for the discussion session which focused on how business could incorporate sustainability. This led to a livley debate about the nature of business and how monetary practices can be used to encourage certain types of behaviour.
Richard Milburn, a PhD student in war studies, who attended the forum said: “It was really good. My opinion is that business is the solution to the world’s problems. At the forum, you get interesting debate and multiple viewpoints. These examples of university start-ups are useful as it is encouraging. It provides inspiration and enables students.”
Sarah and Olivia were both pleased with the first forum, stating that “It was great to see two examples of how to transform a great idea into a practical enterprise, which is really useful for students.”
Overall the event was a great success, and the sustainability team were pleased to see so many students attend and are grateful to both sets of speakers. The next Sustainability Forum will be held in November and addressing the theme of ‘Well being, mental health and green spaces’.
Guest writer: Luke Graham
We had a great Fresher’s week meeting multiple societies and a lot of student and staff interested in sustainability at King’s. We gave out free clipper tea, cycling maps, bags, stickers and displaying our L’Occitane hamper that can be won by completing our survey. It was a great success, with over 550 sign-ups over the two days.
A massive thank you from us goes to EcoSoc, who not only let us share their stall, but helped run a brilliant and successful fresher’s fair (as well as providing some amazing vegan brownies and tasty coconut cupcakes!).
We are looking forward to working with EcoSoc this year, who have their next event this weekend – ‘Escape the city, in the city‘ – a green walk around London.
We hope to see lots of you at our first event as well- the first of the sustainability forum! This is looking at sustainability in business, with two guest speakers from Elephant Branded and ENTO.
We hope you had a great Fresher’s week and look forward to seeing you throughout the year! 
Here at King’s Sustainability Team we’re working hard this week preparing for Fresher’s Fair! This is our first official event this year so we are very excited and can’t wait to meet everyone on Thursday 18 and Friday 19 September.
We’ve got two competitions for you to get involved in: ‘How many fair trade coffee beans in the jar’ – with the jar of organic coffee! We also have our L’Occitane hamper worth £150 to give away; complete our for your chance to win! https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/MXR28MH
We would love to hear your sustainability tips and ideas for King’s. Come say hi and fill in one of our chalk boards or add a post-it to our ideas board at our Fresher’s stall.
We’ve also got flyers, reusable bags and cycling maps to help you get started on your sustainable journey! We also have lots of information about projects, events and sustainable societies to join so come talk to us!
Hope everyone has a great Fresher’s week. We are looking forward to meeting and working with all of you this year!
Hello, I’m Olivia and have recently joined the King’s sustainability team as Sustainability Projects Assistant. After volunteering at Sussex students’ union, whilst studying for my undergraduate degree, as Ethical and Environmental Officer I have always been keen to move into a role working in sustainability within a large organisation such as a university.
Since my undergraduate degree I have worked in various voluntary sector organisations including Stepney City Farm, Forum for the Future and, FareShare, all of which have sustainability at their heart. They have all been wonderful organisations to give me a base understanding in what it takes to practically address sustainability issues in today’s world.
Last September I began a MA in Environment, Politics and Globalisation and King’s so I could gain a deeper understanding of contemporary sustainability issues. So when the job on the Sustainability team was advertised I thought what a perfect opportunity to practically apply what I had learnt during my MA and in previous roles. I am extremely excited to be working at King’s, an organisation that I really care about and want to help become a more sustainable place for students and staff alike. I know it is going to be a challenging role, as King’s is such a diverse and large environment, but nevertheless rewarding!
On a more personal note I am passionate about organic horticulture and food production and would love to have an allotment in London, if only the waiting lists were shorter! I am particularly interested in modern day food systems and the associated sustainability issues. I am also a keen knitter, mad about cycling, book worm and, love disco and funk.
Please do be in touch if you have any sustainability ideas about what you would like to see happen at King’s, no matter how big or small; we are all ears!
Hi, my name is Sarah and I am the new intern joining King’s sustainability team, working as a sustainability projects assistant. I am very excited about joining the team and starting my role, and thought this would be a nice way to introduce myself to everyone. 
I am just about to finish my MSc in Environmental modelling, monitoring and management at King’s which as the title suggests has given me a good background in Environmental studies. I completed my undergraduate at Exeter University in geography as well. In my spare time I set up a small cupcake business, attending the local food market in Dorset (http://www.belmontbakery.moonfruit.com) and I hope to continue this whilst here in London!
I have always been keen on working in a role which can help to make a difference for the environment, so when this internship arose I was delighted! With my background in geography I normally associated sustainability with the environment, i.e. waste and energy. Sustainability, and this role at King’s, covers a much broader spectrum than this, including ethics, culture and food and I am very eager to learn more about these areas.
Being a scientist, I like to monitor and measure things, so I decided to use a carbon footprint calculator at the beginning and end of my internship to see if I can improve my personal sustainability over the year. I used the WWF calculator (http://footprint.wwf.org.uk/) which showed my footprint as 20.9 carbon tonnes, (this means we’d need 3.31 planets to survive if everyone lived like me!). Hopefully over this year I can lower this value, by learning through the internship, and hopefully encourage others across the King’s campuses to do the same.
I am very excited about the next 12 months, working with multiple projects with staff and students across the campuses, as well as providing connections between King’s and external organisations. I am looking forward to engaging with people’s ideas surrounding sustainability and promoting projects that can create change.
I hope to hear from you all soon,
Sarah
Welcome to the blog of the King's Sustainability team! Our aim is to keep you informed about sustainability at King's including events and opportunities, as well as to inspire discussion and action on and around Campus. Please join the conversation!
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