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Climate Action

Climate change is an urgent, encompassing and critical challenge being caused by excessive emissions of greenhouse gases.

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Climate Ambassadors holding a Climate Ambassador sign

Overview

Around the world, we are already facing record temperatures, extreme heatwaves, droughts, wild fires, storms and floods which are all made more likely by climate change and are set to further intensify. Concerted action at global, national, local and individual scales is needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and reduce the impacts of climate change through engineered and nature-based solutions and the conservation and restoration of biodiversity.

SDG 13 demands urgent action against climate change and its impact. We need to tackle climate change from environmental, economic, social and cultural perspectives, fostering and harnessing political will and governance, technological innovation and wide societal and industrial engagement for transformative change. A just transition is critical, ensuring that the costs and benefits of the transformation are shared equitably.

UCD Estates Bike Repair Stand at Belfield campus

Climate Action Plan

UCD has pledged to meet or exceed targets set by the Irish government for public sector bodies under the Climate Action Plan. These are legally binding economy-wide carbon budgets and sectoral emissions ceilings agreed in July 2022 and updated annually.

The following are the requirements for public sector bodies as set out in the Mandate:

  • Reduce GHG emissions by 51% by 2030
  • Increase the improvement in energy efficiency in the public sector from the 33% target in 2020 to 50% by 2030
  • Put in place an annual Climate Action Roadmap

Under its UCD Climate Action Roadmap 2024 update, UCD will:

  • Adopt and integrate applicable climate plan targets in decision making, planning and operation of the university.
  • Develop new buildings to near-zero energy building standard, with a BER of A and energy efficient design (EED) techniques incorporated.
  • Set a minimum target of BER B or better for building refurbishment or deep retrofit projects and deliver significant carbon savings as both fabric and plant are upgraded.
  • Review and update the sustainable travel targets in the UCD Travel Plan 2016-2021-2026.
  • Review and update the Display Energy Certificates in UCD buildings.
  • Measure utilisation and set space efficiency targets under the UCD Space Policy to ensure efficient use of university buildings, offices and spaces in an evolving campus-based university environment.
  • Identify and implement a decarbonisation pathway to eliminate 5,347 tonnes of CO2 from our carbon-energy mix to achieve our 2030 targets. This represents a 51% reduction from the average baseline figure of 10,800 tonnes of thermal CO2.
  • Install no new fossil fuel based energy systems.
  • Re-certify ISO50001 accreditation annually. This is a voluntary international standard to reduce energy consumption and environmental impact.

These actions ultimately contribute to the national climate objective of pursuing and achieving, by no later than the end of the year 2050, the transition to a climate resilient, biodiversity rich, environmentally sustainable and climate neutral economy.

UCD travel plan illustration showing people getting to and from and around UCD by foot, bicycle and public transport

Travel Plan

UCD’s travel targets are outlined in UCD’s (opens in a new window)Travel Plan 2016–2021-2026, Getting There the Sustainable Way, which is guided by three core principles - promoting sustainable travel options, encouraging activity, health and wellbeing and developing an accessible, attractive and welcoming campus.

The key highlights and realistic targets of the plan are to:

  • Increase public transport usage from 41% in 2016 to 43% in 2026
  • Increase walking and cycling from 34% in 2016 to 38% in 2026
  • Decrease car travel from 25% in 2016 to 19% in 2026
  • The above is to be achieved as UCD’s population is forecast to grow from 28,000 in 2016 to 35,000 in 2026.

Research, Innovation and Impact

Together with our national and international partners, UCD's world-leading researchers across the university are addressing climate change through innovation, advice on policy and the management of our natural resources and informing change in practices and behaviour in industry and society, via inclusive, interdisciplinary, collaborative approaches. Work to address climate change is multi-dimensional and is summarised below under a series of categories.

Climate science

Climate science is the study of the Earth’s climate. Climate change refers to long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns. These shifts may be natural, but since the 1800s, human activities have been the main driver of climate change, primarily due to the burning of fossil fuels (like coal, oil and gas), which produces heat-trapping gases. Climate models are used to create projections into the future, generally to the year 2100, for different climate scenarios.

Many researchers in UCD use climate model data in their research. Among them:

Mitigation

Climate action mitigation means reducing the flow of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. UCD supports many reseachers, innovators and projects on mitigating carbon emissions, among them:

Predicting impacts

Predicting the impacts of climate change on both people and the environment is key to preparing for the future.

UCD researchers in this field include:

  • Associate Professor Sharae Deckard whose work examines how climate fiction imagines the future and shapes perceptions
  • Marine ecologist Dr Paul Brooks, whose research is primarily focused on human impacts on coastal systems and eco-engineering solutions.
  • Freshwater ecologist Professor Mary Kelly-Quinn who has led a range of projects on the impacts of climate change and other stressors on freshwater ecosystems and underpinned policy and management advice and decision support tools.
  • Dr Sonia Negrao whose work characterises the impact of flooding on crops.

Developing resilience solutions

Climate resilience is the ability to prepare for, recover from and adapt to the impacts of climate change.

UCD research in this area includes:

  • Diversicrop, harnessing the potential of underutilised crops to promote sustainable food production.
  • The Coastal Communities Adapting Together (CCAT) project which aimed to support coastal communities to understand climate change and how to adapt.
  • A range of research units and programmes centred on climate resilience, encompassing flood prediction, public trust in expertise and crisis prediction.

Just transition

A gap exists in understanding how a low-carbon transition can occur that is rooted in justice and fairness.

UCD Earth Institute’s Just Transitions Research Group explores how the benefits and burdens of decarbonising can be shared equitably so that no one is left behind. Examples include:


Multiple research projects at the Humanities Institute have explored the legacies of mining in various national contexts, with an emphasis on community responses and creative action.

Informing public discourse

Raising awareness and understanding of the effects of climate change facilitates behaviour change and societal support for the actions needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. UCD has many high profile people dedicated to climate action, among them:

  • Dr Andrew Jackson, an environmental and planning lawyer and lecturer in the UCD Sutherland School of Law, whose Climate Case Ireland took the Irish government to the Supreme Court for failing to take adequate action on climate change, and won.
  • Dr Cara Augustenborg, Assistant Professor in Landscape Studies and Environmental Policy, is a key national voice on climate change. She is a member of Ireland's Climate Change Advisory Council and the President of Ireland’s Council of State.
  • Frank Convery, adjunct full professor of environmental policy, is lifetime president of the European Association of Environmental Economists. His UCD Earth Institute blog series explores the important relationship between climate change and agriculture.

Some key Institutes and initiatives

The UCD Energy Institute plays an integral part in the energy transition, endorsing a Net Zero carbon energy system, promoting modernised integrated energy systems and empowering citizens through education, innovation and digitalisation. It works to close the gap between research and industrial deployment, to develop a talent pipeline for the sector and to influence energy policy implementation at Irish and EU level.

The UCD Earth Institute is a key hub for climate-related research, bringing together experts from various fields under its climate theme to collaborate on questions like how should we build in a climate emergency? Can improved understanding of past climates help us to predict and model future climates? How will ecosystems be affected by climate change and how can we reduce negative impacts? How will changing climate influence our ability to provide water and food for growing populations? How can our communities, particularly those in coastal areas, prepare and adapt? What technologies will help us contain our CO2 output, and make the shift to more efficient and renewable energy?

In 2023 UCD and Met Éireann, the Irish National Meteorological Service, announced a new multi-million-euro academic research programme at UCD to support the further development of weather and climate services for Ireland using data science and Artificial Intelligence (AI). The Met Éireann Weather and Climate Research Professorship will incorporate a €1 million annual investment for an initial period of five years.

The UCD Earth Institute, the UCD Energy Institute and iCRAG are founding members of the All-Island Climate and Biodiversity Research Network (AICBRN), a major initiative that brings together leading research centres across the whole island of Ireland to tackle the climate and biodiversity emergency where a trans-national approach is essential.

Innovation Case Study

Headquartered at NovaUCD, Vivid Edge is an Enterprise Ireland high potential start-up (HPSU). This climate action impact company delivers turn-key net-zero carbon projects under a long-term service contract. Their model is to make it easier and faster for large organisations to reduce carbon footprint and to make a material impact on SDG 13, Climate Action.

Education

The UCD Schools teaching in relation to Climate Action include the Schools of Geography, Earth Sciences, Economics, Biology and Environmental Science, and Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy, English, Drama and Film, Biosystems Engineering, Agriculture and Food Science, Law and many others.

Courses include an MSc in Architecture, Urbanism and Climate Action, an MSc in Environmental and Climate Law and an MA in Critical Geographies: Crises, Climate and Inequality.

Illustration poster for UCD Green Campus showing the UCD Belfield campus lake with text reading

Campus Initiatives

Many campus initiatives to address climate change are described in UCD’s Climate Action Roadmap and summarised above. Further details are also provided in the Campus and Operations Action Area under this menu. UCD Smarter Travel, UCD Sustainable Energy Community and UCD Sustainable Research Initiative also exist to underpin climate action and other sustainability initiatives.  Student clubs and societies are listed under the Education and Student Experience Action Area.

UCD Sustainability

University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland.
E: vpsustainability@ucd.ie