This year, CZU ranked 36th in the UI GreenMetric ranking worldwide and repeatedly ranked 1st among participating universities from the Czech Republic. We have thus repeatedly defended our position as the most sustainable university in the Czech Republic, and despite ever-increasing participation and competition, we ranked in the top 50.
The result reflects the institutions' efforts to implement eco-friendly and sustainable programs and eco-friendly policies and change management in the academic community.
The UI GreenMetric evaluation has been running since 2009, and CZU regularly participates in it with success. The assessment takes place in six main criteria - infrastructure, energy and climate change, waste management, water management, transport, and education.
On its campus on the outskirts of Prague, CZU boasts many green technologies that mitigate adverse environmental impacts and contribute to a better climate. These include green roofs covered with various plants, including small trees. In most cases, green roofs divert rainwater into retention basins, where the water is reused for watering or flushing toilets. Green roofs cool the surroundings, improve air quality, increase biodiversity, help with water conservation, and protect the roof surface from external influences, thus prolonging their life. Another example is water filtration devices, which save around 10,000 kg of plastic annually.
The campus includes flowery meadows, parks, areas densely covered with trees, "Libosad," beds with edible fruits and herbs, experimental agricultural fields, ponds, wetlands, animal stables, and thousands of ornamental plants. Part of the care of the campus is composting organic waste, which makes up a large proportion of the total waste of CZU. Last year, 165 tons of organic waste were composted on campus. Students and staff can use five different types of composters on campus. In addition, all waste - including metals, toner, and electrical waste - is comprehensively sorted on campus. For example, the CZU woodworking shop uses all its wood waste to produce briquettes or sawdust used in the CZU stables.
CZU supports the circular economy and offers its students more favorable tariffs for using Uniqway carsharing services in cooperation with Škoda Auto. There is also a CZU Free shop at the campus, which accepts functional items that are no longer useful to someone but would otherwise end up as waste and donates them free of charge to new owners who may still be well served. Similarly, the so-called Reuse Points operate in the CZU Library and the dormitories. Reusable thermo- cups for coffee or ReBaskets for food can be purchased in some on-campus restaurants. You can buy many packaging-free drugstore products in the CZU Shop in the canteen and fairtrade and organic products.
The Czech University of Life Sciences regularly encourages students and employees to adopt a sustainable approach. Each year, students and employees can propose a new measure or project that will help the university become a more sustainable institution as part of the CZU Campus Sustainability Challenge. Selected projects are implemented with the support of the management. In addition, anyone can make suggestions on sustainability at CZU on the website csr.czu.cz.
You can find out about individual sustainability projects on the websites of individual faculties or the CZU CSR website.
