Facts & figures
The path to net zero
Ensuring today’s challenges are not passed on to future generations
As one of the world’s most sustainable higher education institutions, we are pioneering advances in waste management, solar panel and battery technology.
- Ranked equal #1 in Australia and equal #5 globally for sustainability
- All campuses powered by 100% renewable electricity
- Helping Australian businesses implement net zero emissions technologies
- Advised governments on climate change and ‘black summer’ bushfires
- Pioneering green technologies, including a novel way to turn plastic waste into an asset.
As Australia prepares for its third consecutive La Niña summer and research confirms more wild weather is on its way, the words of former US President, Barack Obama, have never been more relevant: “We are the first generation to feel the effect of climate change and the last generation who can do something about it.”
As Australia’s oldest university, with a community the size of a small city (more than 70,000 staff and students) spanning several metropolitan and remote campuses, including some of the world’s top environmental scientists, we are deeply committed to building a more sustainable future.
We have pioneered new technologies for solar cells, renewable energy storage and waste management, including Professor Thomas Maschmeyer’s biomass and plastic recycling technology, which is being rolled out with recycling plants globally in Japan, South Korea, Germany, the UK, Canada and the US with partners Canfor, Shell, KBR, Dow, Mitsubishi Chemicals, LGChem, Chevron Phillips and others.
The University has also recently switched to 100 percent renewable electricity for our campuses, three years ahead of our 2025 target, which has a greater impact than removing 31,200 cars from the road. We have also set ambitious targets to reach net zero emissions and contribute zero waste to landfill by 2030.
Our Net Zero Initiative assists government, industry and communities to manufacture, deploy and adopt low emissions technology swiftly, cost-effectively and at scale, while our education offerings, including the Master of Sustainability and new undergraduate sustainability major, prepare tomorrow’s leaders to tackle the complex challenges of climate change.
Kicking the carbon habit
Emissions are the biggest contributor to climate change. Nations around the world are required to halve their emissions by 2030 and to set net zero targets by 2025 in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Globally, the enormous shift towards net zero has seen annual expenditure in decarbonisation rise to US$2.4 trillion. To “kick the carbon habit”, as Sir David Attenborough put it, we need deep collaboration and partnerships between research, industry, policy makers and the community.
Our Net Zero Initiative, launched earlier this year, does just that.
“The Net Zero Initiative is about helping Australian businesses gain first mover advantage by understanding, developing and adopting innovative and commercially viable emissions reduction technologies early,” NSW Treasurer and Minister for Energy, The Hon. Matt Kean, said.
For example, scaling Professor Jun Huang’s pilot plant reactor that converts carbon and greenhouse materials to hydrogen fuel, or Professor Deanna D’Alessandro’s novel technology that removes carbon dioxide emissions from the air.
University of Sydney Net Zero Initiative
Informing government policies
Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), Professor Emma Johnston, co-authored the co-authored the recent landmark ‘State of the Environment’ Report.
When the landmark ‘State of the Environment’ Report was released in July, environment and water minister, The Hon. Tanya Plibersek called it a “shocking document” that told “a story of crisis and decline in Australia’s environment”, which she would address as a priority.
The Report, co-authored by renowned coastal expert and Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), Professor Emma Johnston, found that climate change is exacerbating pressures on every Australian ecosystem. We now have more foreign plant species than native, and the number of listed threatened species rose 8% since 2016, with more extinctions expected in the coming decades.
"In Australia, many of our ecosystems have evolved in response to extreme events, such as droughts and wildfires,” Professor Johnston says, “but the intensity, the scale, and the frequency of extreme events is now different to what they experienced in their evolutionary history. So, not only are individual species being impacted, but whole ecosystems are being disrupted.”
Our academics have previously advised on the impact of Australia’s ‘black summer’ bushfires, finding 3 billion animals impacted, including 60,000 koalas, and our world-renowned Sydney Environment Institute is currently working with governments to protect wildlife from future fires.
Equipping tomorrow’s leaders
We recognise the key role universities play in shaping our future leaders and are working to embed sustainability across our courses. We also offer a Master of Sustainability, and from 2023, will introduce a new interdisciplinary undergraduate major focused on sustainability.
Our ‘biodigester’, which can break down more than 500 kilograms of campus waste every day, and Curriculum Garden, which features 1000 native species, allow students hands-on opportunities to learn about sustainability topics on-campus.
Our students have also collaborated with Indigenous social enterprise Bruce Pascoe’s Black Duck Foods and circular economy start-up Mercularis, and were the awarded a US$250,000 prize from Elon Musk’s Foundation for their solar-powered unit that removes carbon from the atmosphere.
Students working toward UN Sustainable Development Goals
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